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“Americans Hate Muslims, Too” (And Other Impediments to U.S. Advocacy for Religious Freedom Abroad)

By Chad Bauman

…ts, and other non-Christians suffering persecution around the world. And it will require symbolically potent action, like President Obama’s recent visit to a Baltimore mosque (which, incidentally, was also reported in national Indian media). For those who truly care about religious freedom in India (and the United States), such efforts are not only justified. They are absolutely necessary….

Dispatches From the Beltway: Horton Hears Progressive Religion

By Robert P. Jones

…tic presidential nominees Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, and Barack Obama (Republican candidates were invited but declined) at its Pentecost 2007 conference, where prominent faith leaders asked questions of the candidates. And just last month, Faith in Public Life convened the Compassion Forum at Messiah College, where Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama (John McCain was invited but declined) fielded questions from a diverse group of religious leader…

Cross-Burning Hearing Ends, Trial Set to Begin

By Lauri Lebo

…Freshwater’s attorneys to turn over billing records related to time spent preparing affidavits related to an interview Freshwater was to have had with investigators. Apparently, the Freshwater team has been less than forthcoming at turning over documents related to discovery and appears to have gone to great lengths to avoid providing the material. R. Kelly Hamilton, Freshwater’s attorney, said he could not turn over billing records requested by p…

Bad News for LGBT Anglicans, Mormons, Adventists, Norwegians, Russians, Georgians, Egyptians, Kuwaitis, Saudis…

By Peter Montgomery

…ting with those who seek genuine help starting next week.’ Egypt: Four Men Reportedly Sentenced to Prison for ‘Debauchery’ in Anti-Gay Crackdown Conor Sheils, an Irish writer living in Cairo, reports for Cairo Scene: Four men have been jailed for hosting gay sex parties as part of a brutal crackdown on homosexuality in Egypt. The men were stood accused of hosting so-called “deviant parties” and cross-dressing in women’s clothes. Three were sentenc…

Sometimes Salvation Looks Like Rage: An Open Letter to “Non-denominational” Churches

By Yazmine Nichols

…me and rejection that comes when one of our own wanders or falls away. The phone calls stop, the texts cease, and the friendships end (scriptures such as Matthew 5:30; Matthew 18:15-17; and 1 Corinthians 5:1-13 are usually cited as reasons for “radical” acts of amputation). But how are we defining what is radical? Are we only radical when it comes to sexual sin? Are we radical in our love for the poor? Throughout the Hebrew Bible and the New Testa…

What Liberals Want: A Response to Susan Thistlethwaite

By Frances Kissling

…. And so Thistlethwaite holds forth in “On Faith” but does not pick up the phone and call Peter. And Peter in turn rails against Wallis who in turn ignores everyone he does not think is more powerful than he (there I just did it; I was nasty). Thistlethwaite suggests that the differences are actually about strategy. Liberals demand complete agreement on all issues to work with others on one issue. Progressives want to reach out to moderates and ev…

The Real Mormon Moment

By Joanna Brooks

…hem too. Over the past few days, I have been getting Facebook messages and phone calls from rank-and-file Mormons not interviewed by the Times relaying that they too have been accosted or called in by their bishops for voicing support for greater equality for women in the church, or same-sex civil marriage rights. “I’m really a nobody,” wrote one woman. “Just a stay at home mom who doesn’t particularly go out of her way to take up too much space o…

Pro- and Anti-Muslim Sentiment in Gainesville

By Julie Ingersoll

…entified himself as a Christian of a distinct stripe by advocating burning phone books that advertise abortion and then said he doesn’t have a Qur’an but if he did he would “feed it page by page to (his) goat who would be impervious to its lies.” He then admitted he’d not read the Qur’an because he “doesn’t read fiction.” Another who insisted he didn’t “hate other religions or cultures” then argued that the “so-called Christians” (referring to the…

Are All Religious Experiences Reducible to 16 Desires?

By Andrew Aghapour

…would reduce the list further, and then start over with the reduced list, repeating the process until we came up with the 16 desires. From that 16, we can generate almost any goal. Your model offers some new conceptual resources, particularly for thinking about how people’s “strong” and “weak” strivings inform how they participate in religion. The 16 desires are shared by everybody. We all want the same things from life. We would all rather under…

Secularist Activists Are Being Murdered in Bangladesh: An Ongoing Crisis Causes Many to Flee

By Michael De Dora

…lar and democratic Bangladesh, where people have secure life and enjoy freedom of speech, freedom to publish, and freedom to express.” Still—what has he and his family lost? And what is Bangladesh losing as a result of this unchecked mayhem? Who Will Remain? As the attacks illustrate a deep problem in Bangladesh, these two stories illustrate a deeper success: since February 2015, more than a dozen writers, publishers, and activists—and, in some ca…