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The Shared Assumption Behind Creationism and Anti-GMO in Europe

By Michael Schulson

…creationism in Europe, the influence of the First Amendment, and what anti-GMO and anti-evolution activism have in common. This interview has been edited for clarity and length. Is the appeal of creationism different in Europe than it is in the United States? Creationist beliefs are far more widespread in the US. But, [in Europe], we do have some opinions about how nature works, how nature functions, that I think are anchored in the same cognitiv…

Reformation England Looms Over Contraception Debate

By Sarah Posner

…at’s because it doesn’t answer to religious authority, like monarchs did in 16th century England. The United States is a democracy, an experiment born of events and ideas that took place long after Henry ordered More beheaded; of events and ideas that explicitly reject the notion of either monarchical or religious absolutism; and which protects Americans of all religious faiths from More’s (or Tyndale’s) fate. (The Bishops apparently don’t like th…

A Reporter’s Guide to the New Apostolic Reformation

By Frederick Clarkson and André Gagné

…turn precedes the establishment of his physical kingdom on Earth for a thousand-year reign, and towards what Wagner and others call a “victorious eschatology,” which promotes the idea that before the return of Jesus, the Kingdom of God will grow and fill the Earth, as the Church rises in glory, unity and maturity. For Wagner, “victorious eschatology fits dominion theology like a hand in a glove.” It’s the “primacy” of the cultural (or dominion) ma…

Faith-Baiting in Minnesota and Elsewhere Follows the “Project Blitz” Playbook

By Frederick Clarkson

…better served if we understand these utterances for what they are: political slogans that speak not to the origins of our nation but to a specific point in its not-so-distant past. If they are to mean anything to us now, we should understand what they meant then.”…

An Historic Meeting: African and African Diaspora Women Convene in Ghana for First-Ever Religion Conference

By Rosetta E. Ross

…related to mid-twentieth century liberation movements and, especially, mid-to-late twentieth century liberation theologies. The furor that emerged during the 2008 US presidential campaign over black liberation theology and the recent echo of that uproar during the current campaign only highlights the unlikeliness of a convening of a meeting rooted in mid-twentieth century ideals. Political and economic trends in the United States and across the g…

Excerpt: The Christian Roots of Zionism

By Shalom Goldman

…n the United States, The Fundamentals, a series of essays published between 1910 and 1915 by conservative evangelical theologians, emphasized the necessity to believe in the literal truth of scripture. This helped reify the relationship between the Jews of the present and the Israelites of old. In the view of many in the Christian West, Palestine was understood to be ‘‘empty,’’ and this emptiness should be filled by Jews, the descendants of the la…

Why We’re Not Prepared to Prosecute White Nationalist Violence

By Sara Kamali

…g the USA PATRIOT Act charge of “material support of terrorism,” carrying a 15-year maximum sentence, which is only applicable to FTOs. Entrapment tactics are often deployed to produce such a charge. Further exemplifying the Islamophobia within today’s counterterrorism approach, the Russian Imperial Movement, a foreign—but non-militant Islamist—organization, had its own designation made up for it (Specially Designated Global Terrorists) so as not…

Global LGBT Recap: Homogeopolitics; Dalai Lama Says Gay is OK; Pope Says Civil Unions May Be

By Peter Montgomery

…heir involvement in Ukrainian protests, because of the involvement of right-wing anti-gay groups. In another story, Feder reports on a rise in anti-gay sentiment spreading from Uganda into neighboring Kenya, where homosexuality is technically illegal but where people have not generally faced persecution for their sexuality. Human rights advocates worry that recent debates in Nigeria and Uganda are being picked up by politicians in other countries….

The Right Wing Slant on Religious Freedom is a Slippery Slope

By Frederick Clarkson

…m to their doctrines. Bradley Williams, president of the formerly Methodist-affiliated, Holston United Methodist Home for Children said in a statement quoted in The New York Times, that the agency is “committed to Christian biblical principles” and “places children with families that agree with our statement of faith.” “We view the caregivers we partner with as extensions of our ministry team serving children,” Williams continued. “So from the ver…

Who Defines Religious Freedom?

By Stephanie Russell-Kraft

…r even the Constitution generally, in their justification for opposing same-sex marriage in the United States. It’s more complicated. Instead, they quote Pope John Paul II: Religious liberty is ‘the right to live in the truth of one’s faith and in conformity with one’s transcendent dignity as a person’”… And the Catechism of the Catholic Church: Nobody may be forced to act against his convictions, nor is anyone to be restrained from acting in acco…