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Everything Was Better When We Had God In Our Schools

…ublic schools for good, our schools must have been idyllic places, largely free from the type and extent of violence we see today. Sure, there were the occasional schoolyard fights, but those are a far cry from the premeditated, high-fatality attacks that are seemingly becoming all too common these days. God was allowed in our schools, and the safety of our kids was proof of God’s favor. The problem is that gun violence has been a feature of schoo…

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The Islamophobia Dodge of the Religious Freedom Pledge

…tian. What’s more, though, is how Christian candidates who’ve done much to promote a lack of religious freedom for other religions (e.g., Michele Bachmann’s worry that sharia will “usurp the Constitution” or Newt Gingrich’s calls to ban sharia law because it is “a comprehensive political, economic and religious movement that seeks to impose sharia—Islamic law—upon all aspects of global society”) or who have done little to tamp it down (e.g., Rick…

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What’s Islamophobia, and Do I Have It?

…fter years under an atheist and totalitarian regime, and in fear for their freedom—militarily superior Serbian militias preemptively engage in a mass rape and slaughter. This allegedly constitutes a rebuttal of my point about Islamophobia. But let’s continue with the argument, no matter how outraged we should be. Bosnian Serbs and Croats could have allied; with 56% of the country’s population, the two could have together demanded a secular constit…

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“We All We Got”: The Black Church As an Oasis in Baltimore’s Food Deserts

…nd their well-being at heart. With thousands of children going without the free or reduced lunches they depended on for a midday meal, it was a handful of churches and members of the community that would feed them breakfast and lunch. Meanwhile, national chain luxe-grocer Whole Foods would instead provide food for the National Guardsmen deployed by Republican Gov. Larry Hogan to “maintain order.” People of color in cities such as Baltimore or Flin…

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Fighting Demons, Raising the Dead, Taking Over the World

…demon re-infestations. As with inner-city cockroaches, the price of demon-free living was constant vigilance. Alix Spiegel called some of the practices she saw at Haggard’s church “medieval,” while René Holvast described this new way as incommensurable with modern Christianity: Conversations and discussions with some missionary colleagues did not seem to lead to mutual understanding. The usual evangelical ways of reasoning fell mute. It seemed to…

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Gambian Voters Reject Anti-Gay Strongman Jammeh; Activists Ponder Trump Impact on LGBT Human Rights; Global LGBT Recap

…s a member of the European countries that share common values, such as the free movement of people together with their families.” She said she was confident that the European court would consider free movement “a fundamental right” and recognize a husband regardless of the sex of his partner. Opposition to same-sex relationships is often fierce in Romania, where homosexuality was only decriminalized in 2002. Religious groups want the constitution…

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When Religion is a Refuge for Scoundrels: ‘Ryan Budget’ Edition

…undamentalism.” That encyclical included clear and direct criticism of the free-market fundamentalism at the heart of attempts to dismantle financial reform: The conviction that the economy must be autonomous, that it must be shielded from ‘influences’ of a moral character, has led man to abuse the economic process in a thoroughly destructive way. In the long term, these convictions have led to economic, social and political systems that trample u…

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Does God Hate Health Care? How About Public Schools? Or Bridges?

…or Mormon anti-state conservatism is the idea that these programs mitigate freedom of choice. Mormon theology holds that the purpose of human existence is the free exercise of human agency—the ability to choose—so that men and women can learn by experience and prepare themselves to share in the glory of God. Of course, this emphasis on agency never hindered the nineteenth-century Mormon practices of economic communitarianism. But early twentieth-c…

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The Awkward Silence in the Wake of Jacob Neusner’s Passing

…ment was the greatest gift. Because he never claimed me as his, I remained free. In the years after I entered the academy, Jacob Neusner never acknowledged or responded to any of my scholarly work, although there were many times when I would have loved a response, any sliver of recognition. But in the end, I was one of the lucky ones. I’ve had a career all my own. Since I left Brown, I’ve been beholden to no one. Without him, I’ve been free to cul…

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Romney Accuses Obama of Stifling Religious Liberty

…abstinence education in our children’s schools—their devotion to religious freedom goes out the window. They would force Catholics and others who have beliefs rooted in their faith to sacrifice the teachings of their faith to the mandate of federal bureaucrats. That’s the same Romney who pledged, while he was running for governor of Massacusetts in 2002, “I respect and will protect a woman’s right to choose. This choice is a deeply personal one. W…

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