Religion Dispatches
…boredom? I wonder. Needless to say, to the extent that longevity research promotes ways to alleviate the suffering caused by debilitating diseases such as Altzheimer and Parkinson, they are all very beneficial. However, I also believe that all programs about extension of human life cannot be divorced from the deeper reflection about the purpose of human life. Such reflection seems to be missing from the transhumanist literature. One could object…
Read More…n under investigation by the officials in the prime minister’s office for “promoting homosexuality” since mid-March. The organization has been trying to resolve the matter quietly, but activists in Uganda say privately the investigation could be the beginning of an ominous political turn they have long feared — that the law would work not only to destroy the lives of hundreds of LGBT individuals, but also would become a weapon used against critics…
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…that any Mormon who were to marry and cohabitate with a two living spouses today would be excommunicated. But polygamy has not been eliminated from Mormon life. (I’ve discussed this topic at length here.) The fact is that current Church policy does allow for a living man to be “sealed” (married for eternity) to more than one woman at a time. For example, a widower or divorced man who has elected to terminate his civil marriage but not his LDS temp…
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…U.S.C. § 119 from law. But this year the American Humanist Association is promoting an opposition effort that is fundamentally misguided. Rather than call for its elimination, the AHA wants the annual observance to be replaced by a new “National Day of Reason.” According to its official website, a National Day of Reason would, of course, “celebrate reason,” but it would also “raise public awareness about the persistent threat to religious liberty…
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…sake of the little ones. Many little ones will fall into this sin if LGBT promoters push them. And we also protest for the sake of the LGBT promoters themselves. For their sin will be multiplied by every abused child that they push into sodomy.” Orozco discounts the likelihood of such an appeal, since Belizean law generally bars “interested parties” from appealing if the parties themselves decline. Rather, his focus is on understanding the decisi…
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…hat’s a projection, and it’s based on the analysis of trends that are seen today. My suspicion is that they are underestimating the importance of this new transparency. It takes twenty years to grow a Baptist, and twenty minutes to lose one. And I think that people may be in for some real surprises in those areas. After all, it’s only been a decade or two that this has been an issue for Muslim children. Are they going to let their children have ce…
Read More…more dangerous: A monied and sophisticated indifference to reality. Islam today, science tomorrow. (No, wait; make that misrepresenting Islam and science today.) We must keep in mind the effect this will have on our constitutional rights and freedoms. Those who want to target the rituals and practices of a misunderstood religious community can very easily expand their target to other populations. We’ve come too far as a country, in terms of t…
Read More…tarted becoming a shtick.” In an early October interview with Christianity Today, Warren said that he hadn’t worn a Hawaiian shirt “in two years” and that he “doesn’t even own one.” Warren also said that he was tired of being labeled the new Billy Graham: “I’m very tired of it. I have said many times, there is no successor to Billy Graham… If there is any successor to Billy Graham, it’s Franklin, who has continued to do evangelism. Most media only…
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…rket. But it does seem that the two opposing traditions have come together today to act as a powerful rhetoric of gratitude as indebtedness. Today we have a thriving self-help industry that churns out a steady stream of books on pop psychology, happiness, and gratitude. How well do these grapple with the issues you’ve raised? I was a little surprised by how little attention is paid to the history of gratitude in the self-help literature. I see my…
Read More…eligious traditions. There are bloody, vindictive religious traditions (as today’s not-so-new atheists insist on reminding us), and there are those which soften the human tendency toward vengeance and violence. Religion does not have the answer, because it has all the answers, the right and the wrong. Religion is less a glossary of terms (justice means this, righteousness that) than a grammar, a framework for moral reasoning. It is a language in w…
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