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RDBook: Feminist Theologian Defies the Vatican Agenda

By Rosemary Ganley

…d, Ruether lays out once again her critique of ecclesial patriarchy as life-denying and institution-killing. “When I open her books,” writes Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite, president of the Chicago Theological Seminary, in the foreword to the new book, “a force of mind and heart comes out that simply will not submit to patriarchy. In a truly just world, she would be Pope.” Always a liberationist, Ruether calls again for a church committed to the visi…

By the Way: Fractured Religious Right Endorses McCain

By Randall Balmer

…The meeting (as reported on the website) contained more than the usual over-the-top Religious Right rhetoric of fear. Scarborough warned that an Obama administration would criminalize basic Christian beliefs. Burress asserted that the “difference between McCain and Obama is like the Grand Canyon.” And Garlow warned that California was about to pass a law that would require pastors to perform same-sex marriages. Despite appeals from younger evangel…

RD News Round-Up: October 27, 2008

By Bill Berkowitz

…are on the job. In a recent post at Talk2Action, Wilson writes that the new 10-minute video “features never-before publicly heard audio from Sarah Palin’s key church, the Wasilla Assembly of God and never-before publicly seen footage from Pastor John Hagee’s now-infamous ‘God Sent Hitler’ 2005 sermon, in which Hagee pantomimes a Nazi holding a rifle pointed at Jews. ++++++++++ Hagee Hears a Who-madgeddon For the few gifted enough to retain informa…

Episcopal Church Removes Bishop Who Split Following LGBT Inclusion Vote

By Elizabeth Drescher

…ender couples. One of the founding dioceses of the Episcopal Church in the United States in 1790, South Carolina is the fifth to succeed from the Church, following the Dioceses of San Joaquin in central California; Fort Worth, Texas; Quincy, Illinois; and Pittsburgh, PA. A pastoral letter from Jefferts Schori to members of the Diocese, however, made clear that The Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina, as with other dioceses voting to secede, “cont…

Communication v. Excommunication: Catholic Women and the Church

By Mary E. Hunt

…ptance) to the Roman Catholic institution. This movement began in the early 1980s as mostly Catholic in the U.S. and now includes groups around the world with people from a variety of faith traditions. Women-Church is focused on the needs of the world, not the limitations of the Roman Catholic Church. It encourages its adherents to “be” church rather than try to reform a system that is dangerously out of step with reality. Witness the priest pedop…

‘High Church’ Chronicles: Will Anglican Blessing of Medical Marijuana Open the Door to a Royal Strain?

By Becky Garrison

…t of a new form of high Anglican church? Here the ICBC blog points to a not-so-surprising source, Meghan and Harry, a.k.a. the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. (Harry had to go to a rehab clinic after being caught by his dad for smoking cannabis, while Meghan handed out cannabis gift bags at her first wedding in 2016, and has a cannabis strain named after her called Markle’s Sparkle.) As this royal couple continues to break with tradition, will they be…

Post-Paris Reflections: We May Have to Learn to Hope

By Donna Schaper

…of the end game. We may even have to learn to be positive, instead of knee-jerk negative. We may even have a reason to hope. Of course we are not done. The 55 countries now accounting for at least 55% of global emissions must now ratify the agreement. It affirms a goal of $100 billion annually by 2020 to help poorer countries develop new energy systems. By comparison, the fossil fuel industry receives $600 billion annually in subsidies worldwide….

Indonesia Hears Islamist Arguments For LGBT Criminalization; Zambian Churches Oppose Condom Distribution in Prisons; Lithuanian Conservative Manifesto Calls LGBTs Enemies of Freedom; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…his week that the US Agency for International Development has given a multi-million-dollar grant to fight tuberculosis to Nahdlatul Ulama, a Muslim organization that, while it campaigns against Muslim extremism, has also supported the recent anti-LGBT backlash in the country and called for legislation providing “rehabilitation for every person with LGBT tendencies to return to normal.” Zambia: Churches oppose condom distribution in prisons At AllA…

Challenging Both Homophobia in Islam and Populist Bogeyman of ‘The Homophobic Muslim’; and More in Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…LGBT life in ‘one of the world’s least tolerant countries’ Vice published a 16-minute video documentary, “Being LGBT in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan.” Here’s how it describes it: Pakistan is one of the world’s least tolerant countries when it comes to homosexuality. Being gay is illegal in the Islamic republic and carries a sentence of up to 10 years in prison. Gay men are often accused of bringing shame to their families and commonly face vio…

John Calvin at 500: From Theocrats to Marxists, Calvin’s Vision of Joy and Cruelty Left Complex Legacy

By Paula M. Cooey

…o policing human life and less into rejoicing, were and are a tough and all-too-often nasty lot, to say the least. In fact, Calvin, with others (that fiery redhead John Knox who smashed the stained glass windows of St. Andrew’s Cathedral in Edinburgh, to name the most notable among them) gave birth to the various denominations that make up the Reformed Protestant Church: Presbyterians, the United Church of Christ, Disciples of Christ, and others a…