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Pastor of Kentucky Church Severed From Baptists Over LGBT Inclusion: Not Activism, Just Honesty

By Mike Greer

…the spiritual home for many students, staff, and distinguished professors. Today the 800-member church is a diverse community of faith including people of various races, ethnic backgrounds, sexual orientation, and world-views. Refugees and immigrants compose roughly one-third of the congregation. The church is heavily invested in a wide array of social ministries in the Commonwealth, the U.S., and the world. Below are excerpts from a conversation…

Cinema and the Re-Creation of the World

By S. Brent Rodriguez Plate

…“Christ figure.” In the immortal words of Woody Allen, “If Jesus came back today and saw what was going on in his name, he wouldn’t stop throwing up.” It is safe to say that Allen’s comments can be applied to a lot of religious film criticism. Did you have a specific audience in mind when writing? As with the above point the main audience is, I hope, students. I tried to write this in an accessible way, introducing key themes in religious studies…

Southern Baptists Embrace Minorities, but Not Gays

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

Southern Baptists are feeling pretty good about themselves today. Eleven years after the denomination apologized to African-Americans for supporting segregation and slavery, it elected a black man as its first vice president of the convention—“the highest position yet held by an African-American” in the denomination, the New York Times notes. Fred Luter Jr. pastors a largely black church in New Orleans and is apparently an “overwhelming favorite…

Cornel West: Do Not “Santa-Clausify” MLK Jr.

By Louis A. Ruprecht

…ergy in a room and to move it to his purposes has always been exceptional; today it was sublime. He concluded his address with a litany of prominent African Americans, and what was notable was the presence of so many musicians among them: Stevie Wonder, Ray Charles, BB King, Aretha Franklin, men and women all who linked the Christian gospel to a blues and jazz sensibility that understands all works of creative artistry to be dependent on timing as…

Perry’s Challenge to Bachmann for Religious Right Vote

By Sarah Posner

…explored in a piece for the Daily Beast in June), particularly his role in promoting homeschooling, Lizza gives short shrift to Rushdoony, who is not only a “prominent Dominionist,” as Lizza describes him, but the founder of Christian Reconstructionism and Titus’ inspiration. And, as Julie Ingersoll has detailed on numerous occasions, “Christian Reconstructionist founder Rousas John Rushudoony is often called the father of the Christian homeschool…

2010: What Did We Believe In?

By Gary Laderman

…c barrel, money rules our lives and guides our actions like no other force today. Unemployment, bailouts, national debt, foreclosures, bank regulation, layoffs, and entitlement programs—the list of economic concerns remains the same since the start of the financial crisis in 2008, but the upcoming social, cultural, and political battles over how best to deal with these concerns cuts straight to the heart of national identity—a point made dramatica…

Death of a Self-Proclaimed God-Man: Sai Baba’s Controversial Career

By Andrea R. Jain

…ted to his personal charisma, marketing skills, or both—was extraordinary. Today the International Sathya Sai Organization disseminates Sai Baba’s teachings and manages a network of over 1,200 Sathya Sai Baba centers in 126 countries. Most of his devotees came to acknowledge him as god-man without ever meeting him in person. Sai Baba’s devotees include powerful politicians (including former prime ministers of India), celebrities, and entrepreneur…

The Byzantine Bush Tell-All

By Louis A. Ruprecht

…nd hilarious account essentially made ‘Byzantine’ mean what it means to us today. Justinian was addicted to money; Theodora was addicted to sex. It was a marriage made in hell, and in at least one place Procopius entertains the serious possibility that the emperor was a demon rather than a man. The book is a gold-mine for evidence of reigning social mores in the sixth century in the eastern Roman empire. It is often fascinating to learn what forms…

Birtherism, Conspiracy Theories, and the “Christian Nation”

By Sarah Posner

…rove, and has already been proven, unlike Ike having to prove a negative.) Today, Obama denounced “sideshows and carnival barkers,” adding, “we don’t have time for this kind of silliness.” Which is exactly why he shouldn’t have bothered caving into their ridiculous demands; within moments Joseph Farah of WND decreed the release “raises as many questions than [sic] it answers.” That sideshow, although driven in recent weeks by Donald Trump, was dri…

Confront Death by Avoiding Fritos: The Gluten Lie, Fad Diets, & Foodie Faith

By Michael Schulson

…t those kinds of things with religious and ritual significance. With diets today, there seems to be a lot of fear involved, too. It’s terrifying to live in a place where the causes of diseases like Alzheimer’s, autism, or ADHD, or the causes of weight gain, are mysterious. So what we do is come up with certain causes for the things that we fear. If we’re trying to avoid things that we fear, why would we invent a world full of toxins that don’t rea…