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Can Faith-Based Organizing for Gun Control Work?

By Sarah Posner

…demands, willing to engage in sustained conflict.” In the end, Bean said last month during a panel discussion of the paper, the movement was “built on a house of sand.” Later this month, Faiths United Against Gun Violence is hosting the second annual National Gun Violence Sabbath Weekend, “to remember those who have lost their lives to gunfire, pray for those whose lives have been forever changed because of the loss of a loved one, and to educate…

Why Do Evangelicals And Dems Want Immigration Reform?

By Daniel Schultz

…ue of immigration looms large, with Democrats viewed overwhelmingly as the most favorable party to immigrants. In the same Gallup analysis quoted above, Hispanics’ party identification was 53 percent Democratic to 21 percent Republican, a 32 point pro-Democratic gap. The last survey from the authoritative Pew Hispanic Center, conducted in mid-2008, had a larger 39-point gap in the Democrats’ favor (65-26). Asian Americans, perhaps surprisingly, ar…

The Gospel Church and the Ruining of Gay Lives: An Interview with Anthony Heilbut

By Douglas Harrison

To most students of gospel music, Anthony Heilbut’s name is almo*]}*st as legendary as many of the gospel performers he has chronicled as a writer and recorded as a music producer in his long career. Among his most notable contributions, he wrote the first serious history of black gospel in 1971, The Gospel Sound, and produced a series of well-received records by many of gospel’s golden-age luminaries. Heilbut’s new book, The Fan Who Knew Too Much: A…

Catholic Church Bans Gay Film: This Week’s Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…the Post quoted the group’s leader as saying. The call for legislation was most strongly taken up by the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), a conservative Islamist party that has a small number of seats in the National Assembly. Reuters’ Alisa Tang reported on Tuesday on the climate of fear that has been created: LGBT activists, facing a barrage of homophobia and hate speech by Indonesian authorities, are setting up hotlines and safehouses, while “un…

Why We Must Reclaim “Religious Freedom” from Christian Conservatives

By Bill Berkowitz

…rkowitz: Why did you write When Exemption is the Rule? Frederick Clarkson: Most everyone to the left of the religious right is behind the curve on one of the central issues of our time: religious freedom. Six years ago, most people did not see the storm clouds on the horizon as the Christian Right mounted a major effort to redefine religious freedom. Conservative evangelical leaders working in close—and I think underappreciated—alliance with leade…

Liberty University’s In-House Conversion ‘Therapist’ Retires, But Will the Christian School Cease This Discredited Practice?

By Lucas Wilson

On January 13, Liberty University, the world’s largest and most notorious fundamentalist college located in Lynchburg, VA, announced that Pastor Dane Emerick, who functioned as its in-house conversion therapist, had retired. This news comes to the delight and relief of many alumni who were subjected to his “counseling.” But some wonder whether Emerick’s retirement marks the end of Liberty’s conversion therapy program or whether another damaging c…

Who’s Scared of Polygamy? A Restrained Case for the “Slippery Slope” Argument

By William E. Smith

…at the “new permissive consensus” built over the years by social liberals, most strikingly around same-sex marriage, is the primary driver for this uptick of support for polygamy. Douthat points to cultural developments such as the airing of certain TV shows (e.g. Big Love and Sister Wives), the growing polyamory movement, and the “logic of expressive individualism” to buttress his case. By 2040, he speculates, polygamy will be the law of the land…

Republicans “Evangelizing” Catholic Voters

By Patricia Miller

…is that Bush, an Episcopalian convert to Catholicism, is in many ways the most traditional Catholic of the sizeable number of Catholics jostling for the GOP nod. Bobby Jindal has labeled himself a “Catholic Evangelical” and even hosted “The Response,” a prayer extravaganza that amounts to a full-out paean to Christian nationalism. Rick Santorum has long courted the Christian right with his anti-abortion rhetoric and was once named by Time magazin…

The Great Secret of Constitutional Law: Why Proposition 8 Will (and perhaps should) Be Upheld

By Bruce Ledewitz

…n an issue is being fought in the courts it is public opinion that matters most. We hope that this article will spark a lively discussion. —ed. In a 2002 Newsweek poll, 87% of Americans responded that the words “under God” should remain in the Pledge of Allegiance. Even with the increasing secularization underway in American society, well over three-quarters of the American people undoubtedly feel the same today. What should we conclude if 75% of…

Awakening, Counter-Awakening, and the End of Church

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…and he has good reason for doing that. People don’t understand Mormonism. Most American Protestants and Catholics have a fundamental distrust or uncertainty about Mormonism, so he wants to play it down. If he brings on a vice presidential candidate like (Virginia governor) Bob McDonnell, there’s no way it’s going to be diminished. I suspect that the vice presidential candidate will be the person who carries the narrative for the religious right,…