Religion Dispatches
…ario, Jains run a number of large institutions with many employees, a high number of whom are not Jain. At some point, a number of people realize that the current system is a complicated and inefficient way to feed people, and so there are attempts at reforming the system. One of the questions that the would-be reformers have to consider is: What do most people, in fact, eat? That’s important, because they are trying to craft a system that takes i…
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…y Six”) The summer months, usually the least busy time in DC, brought us a number of political earthquakes, each of which, under normal circumstances, would have dominated headlines for weeks. First, the FBI searched the former President’s Mar-a-Lago residence, prompting bitter reactions from a number of Republicans, in some cases openly weighing political violence as a tool of reaction. Lindsey Graham predicted “riots in the streets,” should Trum…
Read More…said. Chile: Bishops conspire against victim of sexual abuse by priest The Washington Blade’s Michael Lavers reports on a scandal based on emails leaked to a Chilean newspaper showing how two cardinals, including a close adviser to Pope Francis, conspired last year to prevent a gay man who had been abused by a priest from being named to a sex abuse commission created by the pope — and to block him from speaking with other bishops. The man, Juan Ca…
Read More…have the greatest concentration of white supremacists in America), I met a number of Christian pastors and activists. Afterwards, a conservative evangelical told me he felt that Islamophobia and Christophobia were similar (I guess it’s better than denying bigotry exists at all). I also received an e-mail from a participant in the event who came by because of RD: Dear Haroon, Thanks for your talk at WSU tonight and [for] your perspective on things….
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…time edited Pipes’ Middle East Quarterly and is now at the neoconservative Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and Steven Schwartz, executive director of the Center for Islamic Pluralism, a group founded in 2004 which describes itself as “a think tank that challenges the dominance of American Muslim life by militant Islamist groups.” Stanford University historian and Middle East Studies expert Joel Beinin has lambasted the role of these “un…
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…ine Destiny,” the event that kicked off the recent Beckapalooza weekend in Washington DC. It was while watching Divine Destiny that I was struck with what seems like a glaring contradiction. On one hand, Beck and Barton are placing huge political and historical importance on a belief in individual salvation, as opposed to the collective salvation envisioned by liberation theology. But when it comes to worshipping God, religious right leaders insis…
Read More…e larger point: Trump is still the one candidate who coalesces the largest number of evangelicals—even the weekly churchgoers—around him. Those numbers would likely shift should Trump face a two-man race with Ted Cruz. But if survey data still show what they have revealed so far—that Trump will continue to win at least a third of the most frequent church-attending evangelicals—it undermines anti-Trump evangelicals’ main argument about the suspect…
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…e, many secular Americans were dismayed by Michelle Boorstein’s January 14 Washington Post report on secularization and the secular movement in America. The report failed to quote a single religiously unaffiliated young American or secular advocate. Instead, it gave pride of place to observers like Georgetown University sociologist Jacques Berlinerblau—who claims that American secularism is lacking in innovation, leadership, and movement coherence…
Read More…R.A.,” he told me. Nigeria: Anglican church cuts ties with UK diocese; broadcasters get trans reality show taken off air across Africa The Anglican diocese of Akure cut ties with the diocese of Liverpool in the United Kingdom because an Episcopal Bishop from the U.S. was named an honorary bishop in Liverpool. The appointment drew criticism from Archbishop of Nigeria Nicholas Okoh, who chairs the conservative Anglican group Gafcon, who said “a line…
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…ment. There is a widespread feeling that, despite impressive growth in the numbers and capacities of organizations promoting queer/LGBTIA+ issues, there has been little impact on the everyday lives of African queer/LGBTIA+ individuals and communities. Discriminatory laws and policies remain stubbornly in place in almost all countries, and the hostile public perceptions of queer/LGBTIA+ identities that sustain these laws and policies seem as pervas…
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