Religion Dispatches
…ing matters worse, the Pope tried to deflect from the mounting worldwide criticism with a stab at his detractors during his Palm Sunday homily, stating “Jesus leads us toward the courage not allowing oneself to be intimidated by the petty gossip of dominant opinion.” I beg to differ, but this sexual abuse scandal is not petty gossip. It is hardcore fact. In another case, almost at the Vatican City doorstep, students from another school of the deaf…
Read MoreFollowing up on last week’s post about the complaints of Democratic political consultants that their advice to reach out to religious voters was not heeded, thus causing the election losses, a closer look at the numbers fails to demonstrate a causal link. At the Huffington Post, pollsters Robert P. Jones and Daniel Cox of Public Religion Research write: Faced with significant Democratic defeats, however, some activists who advise Democrats on rel…
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…ersecution” they suffer in the United States, the culture wars they are igniting and supporting around the world subject LGBT people and their allies to very real persecution. The role that American religious right leaders have played in fomenting anti-gay bigotry in Uganda has been well-documented, but never before with the emotional punch delivered by God Loves Uganda, a new documentary by Academy Award-winning director Roger Ross Williams that…
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…se the comment was a flagrantly racist response to a tragic hurricane in Haiti, which he called a punishment from God for Satanism—the same episode that Chrissy Stroop ranked as number one on her own top 10 list, and a worthy contender, no doubt! But since Robertson liked to say outrageous things like this on a regular basis, I created a list more attuned to underlying structural aspects of his resume: less about preposterous provocations and more…
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…ever more so than in the face of natural disaster. Such is the case with Haiti. I hear many of us, especially among churchgoers, say to ourselves and to one another: Whatever is, is God’s will. Or, God’s reasons are inscrutable, though they will become clear to us, once we have joined God in the afterlife and see “face to face.” Or God is teaching us a lesson through this event; a greater good can come from this horrific moment. Or suffering is a…
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…this point, and spoken to a lot of Islamophobes, people who had a lot of misinformation about Islam and Muslims. It was a personal thing to me, and it was an issue I thought I could lend my voice to in a satirical space. Were there any particular misconceptions or fears you wanted to address? There was a lot of stuff about Shari’ah Law, the protests against the mosques, the standard stuff—the stories that kept coming up. https://www.youtube.com/w…
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…d question. It was prompted by recent cases brought to the International Criminal Court (ICC) alleging war crimes, or crimes against humanity, by both Israel and Hamas in Israel/Palestine, and by Afghan, Taliban and American forces in Afghanistan. The ICC, based in the Hague, is charged with prosecuting these terrible crimes and its right to do so has been ratified by over 100 countries, though not the United States or Israel. Her question was not…
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…it: for there was no such government in Israel … A democracy is, amongst civil nations, accounted the meanest and worst of all forms of government. [To allow it would be] a manifest breach of the 5th Commandment.” – John Winthrop, first governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony Tuesday night, after his surprising but solid defeat by Doug Jones, Roy Moore refused to concede. Even in Alabama, ground zero for voter suppression, mysteriously broken vo…
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…orried about their nation’s image around the world, and with good reason. Military occupation is never a pretty sight, especially when the occupiers have been there for 42 years, steadily taking over the occupied people’s lands as the whole world watches on television and the internet. It’s not surprising that Israel gets so little sympathy when it complains about its image problem—which only makes many Israelis worry more about their public image…
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“Sometimes the light’s all shinin’ on me, Other times I can barely see. Lately it occurs to me, What a long, strange trip it’s been.” ~ “Truckin’” As the Grateful Dead celebrate their 50th anniversary this year, their historical, cultural, and artistic influence is being discussed, debated, and delineated through commemorative concerts, academic conferences, books, box sets, and a feature-length documentary film. A special series on religion and…
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