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How To Talk To “Nones” and Influence People: Rob Bell’s Transrational Experience

By Brook Wilensky-Lanford

Did I really need to learn How To Be Here, urgently, right now? The book’s publisher had sent me not one advance reading copy, but three. A sign from the universe? I decided to read the book to find out. Or rather, to experience the book. Because that’s the one word that is associated with the work of Rob Bell, a “contemporary Christian” thinker who is at once renegade and establishment. Whether lectures or workshops or books, it’s all part of th…

Mel Gibson’s ‘To-Do’ List

By Becky Garrison

…ay’s Christian Woman 3. Order camouflage Bible 4. Call Pat Robertson for spiritual guidance 5. Put hubbie on short leash 6. See if can find any prayer warriors willing to go all biblical on Levi 7. Send Rush a belated wedding gift Mel Gibson 1. *&^%^%$#@!!! 2. Mail in donation to Christians United for Israel 3. Promote The Passion of The Christ 4. Drink 5. Drive 6. Repeat Pope Benedict 1. Order unkosher communion wafers 2. Get a little behind in w…

How the Catholic Church Broke the Health Insurance it Advocated For

By Patricia Miller

…kus doubled down a few days later when he compared “forcing” men to buy policies that cover prenatal care and contraceptives to “buy[ing] a cabin in Montana that you’re never going to use.” Now aside from the fact that “forcing” women to buy health insurance policies that cover prostate cancer is, in the bad vacation home analogy, like “buying a bungalow on the Jersey Shore that you are never going to use,” Shimkus is correct. Before the ACA, many…

An American Muslim Abroad, Or, Things I Saw in Dubai

By Haroon Moghul

…f the seven, whose territory is 87% of the whole country’s, and Dubai. Dubai is the second of the two, but easily the more famous. In the past fifteen years, the city has grown from a small trading port to a world-class, global city, one of the most dynamic and diverse metropolises in the world. While we make much of the rise of China and Turkey, for example, consider that these are societies with long histories, including great stretches as domin…

Religious Affiliation, ‘Mankind’: India’s Anti-Corruption Activist Leads Second Freedom Struggle

By April L. Bogle

Indian activists are not household names in America—unless you count Gandhi. But former “top cop” Kiran Bedi is a huge figure in her own country, and has lent her considerable status to the grassroots India Against Corruption campaign as the movement evolves. What some are calling India’s Arab Spring has been more like a summer of discontent, complete with demonstrations and arrests, all in support of this epic fight against government corruption…

Is the Satanic Temple Just an Elaborate Prank? 10 Questions for the Author of ‘Speak of the Devil’

By Joseph Laycock

What inspired you to write Speak of the Devil? I started writing on The Satanic Temple for Religion Dispatches back in 2013. What most fascinated me about them was that they were taking hypothetical scenarios that had long existed in policy debates such as, “What if Satanists wanted to lead prayer in public school?” and then they were actually doing them. It reminded me of the George Bernard Shaw quote that, “All progress depends on the unreasona…

NC’s Gay Marriage Ban: “It’s Going to Hurt the Church”

By Nicole Greenfield

…firsthand the rise, and then the fall, of his televangelist parents’ PTL ministry—to speak out against a ballot initiative up for vote tomorrow. If passed, Amendment 1 would modify North Carolina’s constitution to declare “marriage between one man and one woman” as “the only domestic legal union that shall be valid or recognized.” In other words, if passed, Amendment 1 would not only ban same-sex marriage in North Carolina, but it would also prev…

Penn Jillette’s Signs You May Already Be an Atheist

By Steve A. Wiggins

…rust I have in the TSA before, Jillette’s rant in “Penn’s Bacon and a Kiss Airline” was like finding a long-lost brother; another guy who feels it is criminal to be viewed naked by strangers—involuntarily—is a true freedom fighter. This is a comedian with a conscience. He may come down on the wrong side of many traditional issues (global warming and sexual mores, e.g.), but he is keenly aware that too many people suffer. Theodicy in motion. In the…

The Religious Implications of Nudity

By Steve A. Wiggins

…ance-enhancing drugs. The sense of freedom and fun (and free food, even if airline food) was exhilarating. The airport has now become a place of horror. Do they have full-body scanners? I wonder as I’m herded into a long, bovine line. Abattoir or boudoir? Why is this bothering me so much? Don’t Touch Me There Even cursory reflection reveals my embodiment issues are buried deep in my religious upbringing. I was a teenage fundamentalist. That remark…

Ultra-Orthodox Jewish Men “Stand Up” for “Religious Freedom”… On a Plane

By Kara Loewentheil

…h ultra-Orthodox men interfering in your travel, you can just take another airline. If only it were as easy for female employees affected by the numerous lawsuits against the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive coverage requirement to find a better job. *Correction: This post originally indicated that gender separation was due to concerns about women’s menstrual cycles. To read more about gender separation among Haredi Jews in Israel and in the U….