Religion Dispatches
…of women priests, bishops, laywomen, and male clerics. Two figures get the most coverage, though, excommunicated Maryknoll priest Roy Bourgeois and RCWP bishop Patricia Fresen. Fresen, a former Dominican nun who was expelled from her order for being ordained, is a memorable figure. In particular, as she speaks about her process of moving toward ordination she comes across as a truly humble human being—something that can be said all too rarely abou…
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…er senior bishops in their dioceses over the weekend…. The No campaign has mostly been led by a small Catholic think tank, the Iona Institute, and an ad hoc group of conservative newspaper columnists and individuals with little political experience who’ve come together under the name Mothers and Fathers Matter. In addition to organizing the poster campaign, Mothers and Fathers Matter is a clearing house for spokespeople against the referendum for…
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…distance during prayer. Muslims are meant to stand next to each other, but most mosques now ask adherents to stand six feet apart. Cremation, though, remains non-negotiable and has been condemned by Muslim leaders throughout the world, including Sri Lanka. According to early health guidelines issued by the Sri Lankan Health Ministry, the body of a person who has died from Covid should not be washed or touched but placed in a sealed bag in a coffin…
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…s, etc.), but also a broader white supremacist society that denied, in the most abhorrent and violent ways imaginable, the basic humanity of black people. So the very existence of antebellum black newspapers represents an absolutely massive triumph that demands recognition and celebration. In other words, it was the black newspapers themselves, and the people who made them, that inspired me to write a book about the early black press. The Black Ne…
Read More…complete text of Southers’ remarks, courtesy of Media Matters for America: Most of the domestic groups that we have to pay attention to here are white supremacist groups. They’re anti-government and in most cases anti-abortion. They are usually survivalist type in nature, identity orientated. If you recall, Buford Furrow came to Los Angeles in, I believe it was 1999. When he went to three different Jewish institutions, museums, and then wound up s…
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…hammad; at times in full and otherwise with his face whited out or veiled. Most Muslim scholars today condemn the illustrating of the physical features of Muhammad, but mainstream interpreters do not call for death threats against those who make such images. Muslims, like members of other faiths, express their displeasure in a number of ways over those who belittle their prophet. In 2008, for example, a petition was circulated online to remove a 1…
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…there are 80 million atheists in the U.S., a full 26% of the country. The most charitable number I could find was from Gallup, putting the number of Americans in 2014 who say they don’t believe in God at 11%. To make things frustratingly worse, other atheists have been calling Silverman out for falsely inflating the number of atheists for more than four years. And last year, I specifically asked Silverman if he would stop reporting the stats on “…
Read More…s best-seller list. Here’s the description: “Rob Bell addresses one of the most controversial issues of faith-the afterlife-arguing, would a loving God send people to eternal torment forever…? Bell puts hell on trial, and his message is decidedly hopeful-eternal life doesn’t start when we die; it starts right now. And ultimately, Love Wins.” Pastor Bell I know you’re on a book tour right now, so thank you for taking out time to join us on State of…
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…r evangelical schools) was subsequently named one of Princeton Review’s 20 most LGBTQ-unfriendly campuses in 2015—rightly, in Steele’s view. In an interview with RD, he maintained that the administration did little to counter incidents of anti-LGBTQ bullying that were brought to its attention while he was a student. Meanwhile, Lindsay’s administration used a financial crisis to get rid of independent faculty voices (including those with tenure), c…
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…e of ideology. Of the two claims, the change of attractions has become the most controversial. Along with several other ex-gay leaders, Bussee and his Melodyland colleague Gary Cooper helped found Exodus International, an evangelical ex-gay organization. However, they eventually came out of the closet, left their wives and became partners, thereby leaving ex-gay ministry in 1979. Cooper died in 1991 and Bussee has remained a critic of change effor…
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