Religion Dispatches
…f internet technological and capacity innovation before the advent of the smart phone. And if we want to start a serious conversation about where presidential candidates get their money and how ethical that money is, let’s do it. I have a laundry list of labor, environmental, feminist, and human rights issues with multinational corporations I’d love to start working through. But don’t give me a thin, opportunistic connect-the-Mormon-dots story a…
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…coalition, this is hardly a satisfactory answer. Are the Christian nationalists fundamentalists? Catholics? Protestants? If so, what kind of Protestant? To get a more specific answer, PRRI examines two sets of factors. The first set concerns “Charismatic elements in churches.” When most people think of Charismatic practices, they might envision divine healing or people speaking in tongues. But PRRI includes such features as receiving an answer to…
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…esus-as-Messiah—even more curious as to how that question made it onto the list. (And yes, we’re working on that story as we speak.) But in the end, we decided to go above our own heads and ask an eminent group of writers, scholars and activists to respond to the brief prompt: “So what?” Their answers, linked below, tease unexpected meaning from Pew’s results. ________________________ Good News For Bad News Addicts J.J. GOLDBERG Once again we obse…
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…Implements and toys, or not? A single partner, or multiple partners? This list could become very long, very fast), debates over the etiology and moral value of same-sex attraction quickly gained prominence in the nineteenth century’s Victorian version of the culture wars. Even Classicists got into the fray. Debates about Sappho took center stage—she was assuredly the most famous poet from the island until the modern period when Lesbian native son…
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…ico, for example, wryly begins by telling the reader, “Add ‘Bibles’ to the list of items Donald Trump is peddling as his legal fees continue to grow.” Trump’s embrace of a Christian nationalist Bible is framed here as another grift, which is not to be taken seriously. For the savvy reporter, Trump’s embrace of White evangelicalism is just playing the game of politics, and thus requires no further analysis. But we should take the GBUSA seriously. B…
Read More…other hand, it might not. I notice two influential groups missing from the list of supporters for the fix: non-denominational evangelicals, whose churches might be self-insured or find other ways to insure their pastors, and the Catholic Church, whose diocesan plans might be large enough not to be affected by the problem. Both groups, it’s worth noting, are heavily set against the ACA. We may yet see the GOP pinned dramatically between religious c…
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…the charges of plagiarism, to his gaming of the New York Times Bestseller List, to his reputation as a hyper-masculine misogynist and homophobe with an authoritarian leadership style. [T]he scheme itself is part of an overall ethos that seeks to proselytize “by every means available.” What’s important, in other words, is that people hear “about Jesus”—however that might happen. Thus it was not surprising when Driscoll announced this past weekend…
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…and frustration), a bit of Gilligan’s Island, and populated by a character list of Who’s Who in Philosophy: John Locke, Desmond “David” Hume, Rousseau, and George W. Bush’s favorite philosopher, Jesus (as Jack “Shephard”). Or consider the cast of 30 Rock as a reinvention of The Mary Tyler Moore Show: Liz Lemon=Mary Richards; Jack Donaghy=Lou Grant; Pete Hornberger=Murray Slaughter; Tracy Jordan + Jenna Maroney=Ted Baxter. These cultural products a…
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…f the mother. Aronofsky continues his quest to audio-visualize Jewish Kabbalistic themes, threaded with some psychoanalysis, poetry, and surrealistic montages. Follow the logic through and it’s a dim view of humanity, and of G-d. 3) Mudbound Rachel Morrison’s cinematography emphasizes the mudbound. Drawing on photos by Dorothea Lange and other WPA photographers, and paintings by Thomas Hart Benton, she visually sacralizes the profane. This is no…
Read More…chance that the bill—a measure to ban suspects on the federal terror watch list from buying guns—was going to become law. But a vote would have forced Republicans to go on record voting for gun rights over protection from terrorism, demonstrating their hypocrisy. In an already-dicey year for GOP incumbents, that would have been a very uncomfortable position. Doesn’t this set a dangerous precedent? It might, although Republicans staged a longer pro…
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