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Pawlenty, Romney Won’t Sign FAMiLY LEADER Pledge

By Sarah Posner

…form is like slavery.) Meanwhile, the Pawlenty campaign has released a six-minute video in which the candidate and his wife vouch for each others’ evangelical credentials. It opens with gauzy images of him and his wife, Mary, and proceeds to their telling of her upbringing as an evangelical, his decision to be evangelical rather than Catholic, and, well, just how much they love and trust God and how Pawlenty’s faith influences his politics. They’r…

Op-Ed: Ramadan and Religious Freedom

By Sumbul Ali-Karamali

…prevent them. Moreover, the Muslim sunset prayer takes only three or four minutes. It’s hard to believe that a five-to-ten minute break at sunset for plant workers is a hardship for the employer. The non-Muslim workers at the plant in Colorado, as well as the community in Tennessee, in giving vent to their anti-immigrant and anti-Islam feelings have missed an important point: whatever their personal sentiments about immigrants or other religions,…

So Deep a Wound: Home, and the novels of Marilynne Robinson

By Garret Keizer

…ts are shown to be sinners and sinners saints. Nobody deciding at the last minute not to get on that plane. Yes, Glory has something of an epiphany at the end, but it takes no epiphany on the reader’s part to see the uneasy mix of beatitude and desperation in what she feels. Only a Christian of uncommon mettle could write a novel so untainted by the bastardized tropes of Christian culture. It is as if Robinson told us the Nativity story without on…

Israel Under Bush: The Islamophobia Years

By Joel Schalit

…al gestures toward peace in the Middle East, we also saw a remarkably high number of attacks on Islam, on Iran, and on Arab Americans. There was the Republican outing of Barack Obama as a ‘secret Muslim’ and the promotion of this theory to both elderly Jews and conservative Christians. One survey, released in October, showed that at a sizable portion of the Texas voters polled actually believed Obama to be a Muslim. The other glaring example was t…

Bad Karma: Life Lessons From Earl

By Anthony B. Pinn

…m and national loyalty. But this show, if extended beyond its immediate 30-minute airtime, projects a different posture: actions have consequences. Perhaps the United States, like Earl, must examine its conduct, recognize the web-like nature of human interactions, and acknowledge at least the possibility that the United States as a nation has not lived up to the best of its democratic ideals, has not represented in its internal practices and forei…

RD News Round-Up—September 29, 2008

By Bill Berkowitz

…ll of Dayton and words from the 25th chapter of Matthew.” (To hear the one-minute ad go here) On September 24, the Presidential Prayer Team, described by Charisma magazine as “a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization whose mission is to pray for national leaders year-round,” launched an effort called 40 Days to Pray the Vote. “Together, we will make this the most prayed-for election in the nation’s history,” said John Lind, president of the President…

John McCain: No God But Country

By Kathryn Lofton

…ent, and maybe it matters to you. McCain has noted several times that the “number one issue… that people should [use to] make a selection of the president of the United States [is] will this person carry on in the Judeo-Christian principle that has made this nation the greatest experiment in the history of mankind?” A person’s faith is, according to McCain, an “important part of our qualifications to lead.” Bracketing his dubious grasp of constitu…

This is Not a Religion Column: The Audacity of Compromise…

By Jeff Sharlet

…ng via the liberationist preacher Jeremiah Wright — disinvited at the last minute from Obama’s 2007 announcement of his candidacy, nowhere to be seen in Denver. Last Thursday, Obama made history not by introducing liberationist ideas into American politics, as readers of Obama’s 2006 campaign book “Audacity of Hope” might have, well, hoped, but by reviving the Social Gospel’s cautious optimism. That’s no small feat in a country where “liberalism”…

RD News Round-Up—September 22, 2008

By Bill Berkowitz

…ver.” Although encouraged by the Democratic Party’s “pledges to reduce the number of abortions, … [he] now worries [that] the party is using abortion as a wedge issue by running ads sharply contrasting Palin and Obama on abortion rights,” AP reported. “Strang said he’s waiting for the Republicans to talk more about health care and the economy—and is both intrigued and unmoved by Palin. ‘It’s a great story, but I don’t know what’s changed,’ he said…

RDBook: Sex, Power, and the Future of the World: An Interview with Michelle Goldberg

By Mandy Van Deven

…mpromising the integrity of an indigenous organization’s work? There are a number of organizations that are really good at channeling aid to women working at the grassroots. The Global Fund for Women, for example, does amazing work. On a more macro scale, people in developed countries often have access to levers of power that people on the ground don’t. Agnes Pareyio’s story is instructive. She’s an amazing Masai woman in Kenya who runs a shelter…