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Cherry-Picking in the God Gap: A Post-Election Conversation on the Religious Vote and the Battle to Spin it

…ple mechanics: editors think talking with the salt of the earth at some midwestern diner or southern church makes a more compelling story than talking to a random secular office worker in a big city Starbucks. And some of it, honestly, is post-2016 trauma. Journalists believe there’s some “hidden America” they have to uncover to truly understand what’s going to happen in the next election. That’s why there are all these stories about Trump voters…

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Pope Tweeted into Retirement

…d appeared the year before, and Mark Zuckerberg was feverishly writing the code that would become Facebook. YouTube was just an idea, and wouldn’t appear online in any form until 2005. John Paul did embrace social media as it existed then. He was the first pope to use SMS to send out a daily message to Catholics in 2004, after brokering a deal with Verizon—one of the first troubling commercial agreements between the Vatican and communications comp…

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Hillary Flirting with Fear

…close enough for vote-tampering to give him a victory. Was it “values” (a code word for conservative religiosity) or national insecurity? When Democratic strategists Stanley Greenberg and James Carville asked “Why America Wanted Change But Voted for Continuity” in 2004, they came up with the best answer: “A narrative is the key to everything, and the Republicans had a much more coherent attack and narrative… The president was able to keep the ele…

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RDGenerations: Youth and Liberal Religion

…to conduct our life together at the National Youth Event in a manner that promotes a community of faith.” Literally, that manual spent three times more words trying to get the kids to drink water instead of Coca-Cola in the heat than it spent on its entire religious/theological content. It made me wonder if the football players or UCC kids had more rituals and prayers during their weeks. L: Your example catches the flavor, but there is more to sa…

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The Blockbuster Spirituality of John Green’s “The Fault In Our Stars”

…icrobe cells, mutated cells. We are built, too, of our parents, of genetic code and flesh and blood and bones that grow inside of flesh and blood and bones. So we come again to the parents: “There is only one thing in this world shittier than biting it from cancer when you’re sixteen, and that’s having a kid who bites it from cancer,” Hazel tells us. Green, who is now the parent of two children, told The New Yorker’s Margaret Talbot, that his own…

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Tinkering with Creation: Intelligent Design 2.0

…ionists’ latest strategy. His is merely relying on what Forrest calls the “code words.” But their long-term goals remain the same: To get God into science class. The full statement in the Texas standards reads: “The student is expected to analyze, review, and critique scientific explanations, including hypotheses and theories, as to their strengths and weaknesses using scientific evidence and information.” (Italics added.) McLeroy considers common…

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South Dakota Bill Could Legalize Killing Abortion Doctors

…e made in the committee hearing on the bill last week. “If you look at the code, these codes are dealing with illegal acts. Now, abortion is a legal act. So this has got nothing to do with abortion.”  Here is the bill in its entirety: FOR AN ACT ENTITLED, An Act to expand the definition of justifiable homicide to provide for the protection of certain unborn children. BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF SOUTH DAKOTA:      Section 1. Th…

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Is Alcoholics Anonymous a Religion?

…that the phrase “spiritual but not religious” was coined by AA. Over time Western societies have liberalized, leaving AA to the right of present cultural norms. The “God of your own understanding” sounded so liberal in the 1930s whereas now, mention of the word “God”—regardless of the qualifiers that follow—reeks to secular liberals of a dogmatic conservatism. To show how definitions of “religion” and “spirituality” are used rhetorically we need…

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Why Aqua Buddha Ad Failed to Harm Rand Paul

…slavery.) And what about secret paganistic societies with odd behind-closed-doors rituals? That too is classic Americana—just as American as the Freemasons. What really breaks the good Christian folks code of conduct is not engaging in questionable behavior but rather exposing the indiscretions of other good Christian folks, especially after they get established and powerful….

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Is Michelle Obama Out of Line?

…reotypes. Finally, Obama is grievously out of line for violating the tacit code of silence that plagues our country on issues of race, racism, and slavery. Many believe that it is politically incorrect to talk publicly about America’s perennial sins (both past and present) or to speak of America as anything but “the promised land,” or the fabled “City upon a Hill.” This includes bringing up any of America’s contradictions, such as the construction…

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