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Mike Johnson isn’t Just Your Average Christian Right Avatar — He’s Influenced by Fringe Movements Unfamiliar to Most Political Analysts

By Annika Brockschmidt

…second place in line to the presidency: “I don’t believe there are any coincidences. I believe that scripture, the Bible, is very clear that God is the one that raises up those in authority, he raised up each of you, all of us. And I believe that God has ordained and allowed us to be brought here to this specific moment and time.” Johnson is a White Christian nationalist (and a true believer at that), part of a growing number who see right-wing r…

Who Would the Buddha Bomb?

By Danny Fisher

…ook An Introduction to Buddhist Ethics, Peter Harvey chalks these seeming inconsistencies between Buddhist peacefulness in theory and practice up to “unresolved human fears and attachments aggravated by politically unstable times.” But whatever the reasons, this much is clear: the role of Buddhists and Buddhism in violence and warfare has been more complicated than popular understanding would have us believe. As Buddhist religions continue to make…

“That Guy In Rome”: A Catholic Town in Idaho Where The Pope is a Heretic

By Jason Wilson

…egation in 1984 amid allegations of sexual impropriety and administrative incompetence. The CMRI moved its headquarters to Omaha, Nebraska, under a new bishop. In many ways CMRI exhibits a pattern found in the more extreme traditionalist organizations: erratic leaders, improvised and dubious forms of ecclesiastical succession, an increasing isolation from the mainstream Church—and a hefty dose of conspiracy thinking to account for how post-concili…

The Progress of Christ in Commercial America: A Review of Chris Lehmann’s The Money Cult

By Peter Laarman

…ividual self-improvement rather than challenging the presumption and arrogance of wealth. Hence his title, “The Money Cult”: in what many are pleased to regard as a Christian nation, the functional faith of most believers has usually boiled down to a sanctified form of acquisitive individualism. It’s not possible to summarize the full sweep of Lehmann’s narrative here, but his sensitive treatment of several important sub-themes deserves to be high…

Updated: G-O-D Plays a Bit Part in First GOP Debate

By Daniel Schultz

…nday School. Rubio talked about the VA, and Carson apparently thinks the “bully pulpit” refers to something you’d see in church. And that was pretty much it. On faith, as on every other topic of the night, it was less thesis-support-conclusion than “throw out a bunch of keywords and see what sticks.” After two hours, I’d managed to pace myself to only two gin-and-tonics. Given that we have five more of these things between now and November 2016, I…

Is Abortion No Longer Significant for Evangelicals — or Has it Just Become Like Water?

By Bradley Onishi

…who wants to hurt children? But racism, xenophobia, and authoritarianism are now re-mainstreamed in conservative politics in ways they haven’t been since the 1970s. Where reproductive rights discourse once functioned as the most effective pathway to smuggle disdain for “others,” it’s now just one avenue among several that white evangelicals take to advance their political agenda….

Boo! Trump’s Lead With Religious Voters Not As Bigly As You Might Think

By Daniel Schultz

…s I wrote this post, FBI Director James Comey launched a bombshell by announcing the agency was examining previously-unreleased emails from Hillary Clinton’s tenure at the State Department. Still, between the browning of Catholicism, increasing secularization, and a possible rift in the Evangelical vote, I wouldn’t want to be in a Republican religious strategist’s shoes this year. Update 10/31: PRRI released a teaser on their analysis of the Catho…

Is Army’s New “Humanist” Designation Just Semantic Hooey?

By Elizabeth Drescher

…lications as well. It gives Humanist service members access to Army Chaplaincy services, including spiritual counseling and gathering spaces for Humanist groups. It also means that the numbers and distribution of Humanists in the military can be tracked along with those of other religious groups, potentially inviting a reshaping of the military chaplaincy, which critics complain is inappropriately weighted in favor of Christian, and specifically E…

Religious Kids Are More Selfish: The Stickers Don’t Lie

By Michael Schulson

…anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, sexism, and so on. In many cases, social science—and especially experimental social science—tries to produce generalizations about human beings, too. Sometimes, it seeks to do so about a specific subset of the population (say, Christians or Muslims). I want to be 150% clear here: when researchers seek to find general principles or patterns in human society, that does not make them racist, or anti-Semitic, or Islamopho…

Religious Opposition To LGBT Equality Softening

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…g religious presence has grown in gay pride parades around the world: The increasing Christian acceptance of same-sex relationships is highlighted by the image of liberal, evangelical, Catholic and other Christians marching together at Pride. In recent years, the small number of Christians who turn up to protest against Pride have been vastly outnumbered by the Christians participating in it. Hill also noted religious support in the UK last April…