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Are Christians Theologically Prepared to Accept Torture?

By Sarah Sentilles

…government uses a version of atonement theology to sanction torture and abuse: soldiers and military police are ordered to use “harsh techniques to gain information to save lives”; they “felt pressure to obtain information that could help save the lives of American soldiers.” [1] Might atonement theologies and images of the crucifixion prepare Christians to see torture as salvific? After my presentation, a woman from the audience spit in my face….

This Year in Satanism

By Joseph Laycock

…the Satanic Temple demanded an apology. FEBRUARY In February, the media focused on Miranda Barbour, 19, who was accused of killing a man she met on Craigslist. The “Craigslist Killer” alleged that she had been inducted into a Satanic cult at an early age and was forced to kill numerous people. In interviews, Gilmore and Greaves dismissed Barbour’s claims, diffusing some of the Satanic Panic. MARCH Fred Phelps died on March 19. Amid rumors that the…

Guns and the Wyoming Legislator Proposing the Shari’ah Law Ban

By Sarah Posner

…ess to translate the Nazi Gun Control Act of 1938 into English so he could use it for the U.S. Gun Control Act of 1968, and more generally insists that the citizenry needs to be armed against government “tyranny,” which can lead to genocide. This sort of conspiracy theory is not unlike those being promoted by far right Christian groups after the Tucson shootings. When the group’s founder, Aaron Zelman, died in December, he was praised by one-time…

Catholic Church is Lucky it’s Just Same-Sex Marriage

By Marian Ronan

…n said, “Hi. I’m so and so, and I’m a lesbian.” Then she paused. “Well, I used to be a lesbian,” she added, “but my partner had a sex-change operation, so now I’m not exactly sure what I am.” And that was just the beginning. Next there was a newspaper article about women Olympic athletes being eliminated from competition because tests revealed that they were genetically male, something about which they themselves hadn’t a clue. Then there was Suz…

Focus on the Family Goes to Bat for Bullies

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…man beings are created in God’s image and they deserve to be protected because they are a human being uniquely created by God with innate dignity and worth, and not because of how they identify sexually.” Honestly, could she even hear herself? If she and FotF truly believed that, and encouraged conservative Christian parents to actually teach that to their potential bullies in training, then there would be no need for anti-bullying legislation. Bu…

Top Five (Less Sensational, But More Dangerous) Things to Remember About Pat Robertson (1930-2023)

By Mark Hulsether

…” (through his work with the United Nations in the first Gulf War). This caused few of Robertson’s neoconservative allies to break with him in any decisive way—although one former neocon, Michael Lind, denounced him in a major exposé in the New York Review of Books. Moral of the story: Although this item overlaps with the one just considered—Robertson as central to the Republican coalition—I rank it separately and higher because anti-Robertsonite…

Thoreau’s Ferocious Critique of Philanthropy Does Not Make Him “Selfish”

By Alda Balthrop-Lewis

…“helping other people.” Thoreau avoided philanthropic enterprises not because he resented helping other people (there are too many examples in which he did provide help to others) but because he thought philanthropy was usually driven by selfishness. He wrote: “Philanthropy is almost the only virtue which is sufficiently appreciated by mankind. Nay, it is greatly overrated; and it is our selfishness which overrates it.” Philanthropy, he thought,…

Khalifah: We Really Do Have Control Over Our Own Destiny

By Amina Wadud

…e, on this, that (and the other). Honestly, I found this very curious. Because I have always been taught, even as a Christian, that I had responsibility for my own soul. My father, a Methodist minister, used to say, “I can’t go to the Judgment for you. You have to go for yourself.” I never forgot this. As a Muslim, the interrelationship between us, as creatures who believe in and intentionally orient ourselves towards God/Allah/the Lord, is one wh…

Spinning Ft. Hood

By Hussein Rashid

…yer. I prayed for the souls of the victims and for their families, not because the alleged perpetrator is Muslim, but because as a Muslim, that is what my religion teaches me to do. Shahed Amanullah, on the other hand, is more angry: Oh, the overwhelming feeling I’m hearing is anger. I mean, the Muslim community of Central Texas has many connections to both Fort Hood and the military. There are many members of the services who are in the community…

How New Religions Are Made

By Jacob S. Dorman

…editor now at the University of Washington Press. I love Chosen People because I think that expresses what is at the heart of Black Israelite identity: an assertion of chosenness, a reframing of history and the sacred. My regret about the title is that you would never know the book contains histories of white Israelites, or documents the important role the Israelite idea played in the rise of the Pentecostal movement. So I am afraid it is going to…