Search for "cheap airline tickets from dom. rep. phone number 1-800-299-7264"

Ultra-Orthodox Jewish Men “Stand Up” for “Religious Freedom”… On a Plane

By Kara Loewentheil

…e can imagine it might be a safety issue in some situations), and the news reports have treated it as a kind of amusing oddity. But what’s interesting here is the pattern of behavior, which replicates the broader social and political movement strategies we’ve seen on a personal scale. First, you try to convince people to do what you want—so, for example, if you’re an ultra-Orthodox man on a plane, you ask the woman next to you to move elsewhere, o…

What’s More Frightening Than Snakes on a Plane?

By Devin Kuhn-Choi

…ements, is that it isn’t a question of women’s rights versus religious freedom, as some reporters have framed it, and it isn’t actually an issue of religious freedom at all. Rather, these culture war battles are about trying to impose one’s own religious beliefs as a trump against all other perspectives, religious or otherwise. Why aren’t the men whose religious beliefs are at stake the ones switching seats? Why do the women need to move? Why do e…

No Conspiracy Theories Needed: Abortion Foes Cry Racism

By Kathryn Joyce

…slow “black genocide.” Another such moment came last September, when four Republican and two Democratic congressmen—led by anti-abortion stalwart Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ)—proposed a new bill to the House: the Susan B. Anthony Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act of 2008, which would “prohibit discrimination against the unborn on the basis of sex or race, and for other purposes.” (The invocation of Anthony’s name is in keeping with the anti-abortion mak…

Houston’s Pastor Subpoenas: A Meme Made for Fox News

By Sarah Posner

…he city’s mayor, Annise Parker, because she is a lesbian. As the Texas Freedom Network reported in 2011, when Parker was running for reelection, Dave Welch, one of the subpoenaed pastors, released a video in which he said: It is astounding to have to say that most Houston citizens – including most Christians and pastors – are still unaware of the radical nature of Mayor Annise Parker’s commitment to imposing the full “San Francisco Style” Gay, Les…

Waiting for Lightning to Strike: A Wobbly Agnostic among the Atheists

By Carolyn S. Briggs

…that explains why black men aren’t in the church, but they aren’t exactly represented in this audience, either. She’s got it—that connection with the audience that every speaker wants. We’re delighted with her. We don’t want her to go away and be replaced with some mumblecore scientist giving us facts and figures telling us why intelligent design is full of holes. She tells us to go into the churches and get the unconvinced Christians out, and I’…

More Mixed Signals from Pope Francis; Church of England Wrestles with Rifts; Faith Groups Lobby Pro & Con on Irish Referendum; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…port recommends marriage equality, gives hope to sexual minorities Reuters reported this week that “a new report recommending that the Himalayan nation allow same-sex marriage” has given hope to sexual minorities in the country. Officials from both the ruling center-left coalition and other parties have refused to say whether they will back the recommendations, which were submitted by the government-appointed panel of experts last week. But the ch…

The Sacred and the Dead: The Trouble with Sugar Magnolia

By Kaya Oakes

…r on a car. I am a relapsed Catholic, and thanks to my friend, I am also a repentant Deadhead. Dear Jesus, let me confess: I even wear Birkenstocks. Shannon. Deadshow, Deadhead. Dominquez Hills, 1990. Photo by ChasM3/https://www.flickr.com/photos/chasm3/ “Sugar Magnolia,” however, still presents a challenge. Written by Robert Hunter and the band’s rhythm guitarist Bob Weir, its lyrics would raise the hackles of even the mildest of feminists. The s…

Wichita, the Sequel: A Clinic Reopens at Ground Zero in America’s Fight over Abortion

By Kathryn Joyce

…was caught after the murder, fleeing halfway across the state, he had the phone number of an Operation Rescue leader on his dashboard—the tip of the iceberg in terms of the broader connections he’d built with anti-abortion extremists. The church, Roeder would later testify, emerged as the only place he could find a shot at Tiller, around the elaborate security measures the doctor had learned to follow at his clinic and home. “Justifiable homicide…

Death in the Desert: Riding With the Samaritans

By Lauri Lebo

…grants from their homes. They are pulled to the U.S. because of demand for cheap labor. One of the major pushes came in the ’90s with the passage of NAFTA, which opened the door to many agri-businesses to move farms down to Mexico, putting small farmers out of business. And while the number of undocumented border crossers is down, Brother David says, it will be virtually impossible to eliminate them as long as the opportunities for jobs exist. As…

Does War Make Sense? Science and Religion on the Battlefield

By Nathan Schneider

…very difficult to extract should the politicians ever want to. Already outnumbering the regular soldiers deployed in Iraq, this highly adaptable force blurs the lines between business and warfare, military and civilian. Contractors have taken part in human trafficking, accounting fraud, and murderous outbursts that usually escape prosecution. In place of religious fundamentalism, their way of warfare follows another kind of science: that of Ameri…