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Like Azusa Street Baptized into Bureaucracy: Mexico’s Flourishing LLDM Church Loses its Apostle

By Michael Schulson

…e themselves as charismatic or Pentecostal Christians (38%).” Pinning down precise numbers for LLDM is almost impossible. The church claims to have more than three million members abroad, and 1.5 million in Mexico, which would make it the country’s largest non-Catholic religious institution. The 2010 Mexican census reported only around 200,000 members, but that number may well be low (the Mormon church in Mexico has argued that the religious count…

How Religion Shapes (or Doesn’t) Our Views on Public Issues

By Daniel Schultz

…. That’s the number of people who can be persuaded on religious grounds to preserve reproductive rights. Common ground on this subject does not work. The best you can hope for is to change the subject, and we all know how well that worked during the health care reform debate. (Conversely, .82x.26=.21, or nearly all of the Republican base.) Second: nobody gives a rat’s patootie about religious views on immigration or the environment, except religio…

Did North Carolinians Vote Against their Own Beliefs?

By Peter Montgomery

…rolina residents believe that gay couples should have access to some legal protections. But because most voters didn’t understand just how extreme and far-reaching the amendment before them today was, they would vote for it to “protect” marriage. According to PPP: In some sense North Carolinians are voting against their own beliefs. 53% of voters in the state support either gay marriage or civil unions, yet a majority also support the amendment th…

‘It’s a Gay Problem,’ and Other Myths From the Catholic Church’s Sexual Abuse Crisis

By Joelle Casteix

…others who sexually abused kids—and were protected by the same system that protects predator priests—but never took any vows of celibacy. Using sex as a weapon of violence against vulnerable children is not an unwanted side effect of celibacy. “It’s not really pedophilia” Labeling victims because of their physical development minimizes and normalizes sexual assault. Victims of “pedophilia” (children victimized pre-puberty), church defenders say, a…

Packed with Threats of Political Violence, Media Largely Ignore the NAR’s ‘Million Women’ Rally in DC

By Frederick Clarkson

…lor thought it was less. But certainly tens of thousands attended, and the number may even exceed a hundred thousand. Whatever the actual number at the Mall, the audience was much larger since the event was live-streamed on Facebook, YouTube, and Rumble and translated into several languages. The Jumbotrons that lined the Mall were alternatively closed captioned in English and Spanish. It’s difficult to imagine any other religious or political even…

A Peek Inside the ‘Onion’ of Scientology

By Kristin Rawls

…oving, generous father. They always described him as fatherly, nothing inappropriate. Now Miscavige likes to have pretty girls around, but again, I have never heard of him being inappropriate with young girls. I know a lot of women who’ve had major, powerful roles in Scientology management. There are a lot of women church executives, and it’s very egalitarian in that way. They just don’t look at you as a gender and are not bound by some of the tr…

Punks vs. Monks: Rockers Speak Out Against Genocide in Myanmar

By M. Sophia Newman

…tied to the government. Minister of Religious Affairs Sann Sint has openly praised the monks. Meanwhile, President Thein Sein has reacted to the humanitarian crisis by asking the UN to remove the Rohingya from Myanmar. (The UN declined.) Punks, in contrast, exist as an underground movement with minimal government ties. Prior to the 2010 government change, they operated largely in secret. It is unclear whether the tiny punk movement in urban Myanm…

Like a Virgin

By Donna Freitas

…disclosure: “Sex and the Soul” is the name of my new book, forthcoming in April from Oxford University Press on the subject), I met a number of evangelical Christian young women who had “repackaged their virginity” (as one woman called the process). I wonder how dismissive and cynical people would be after hearing some of their stories? There was nothing funny about these young women’s sexual identities. Yes, my feminist radar went up and pushed m…

If You Liked The Martian You’ll Love These 3 Sci-Fi Shorts

By Andrew Aghapour

…with many praising its grounded, human focus which, in contrast to Scott’s previous sci-fi thrillers, Alien, Prometheus, or, arguably, the awful Exodus: Gods and Kings, is devoid of aliens, mysticism, and supernatural forces. Instead, The Martian is about smart people solving difficult problems. (How do you grow food on Mars? How do you send more food to Mars as soon as possible? How do you get water out of rocket fuel?) Scott highlights this prag…

Exclusion is Causing Great Harm: A Conversation With Suspended UMC Pastor Rev. Cynthia Meyer

By Joel Pitney

…rawn to youth group. So I got involved in my local United Methodist Church pretty deeply during my junior high and high school years, participating in youth programs and trips. The church helped me learn about the world. That really meant a lot to me. By the time I was a senior in high school, I had a conversation with the pastor about feeling called to ordained ministry. I was ordained in 1990, so 26 years ago. I was ordained into the Kansas East…