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New Research Links Spiritual-Not-Religious to Mental Disorder

By Elizabeth Drescher

…assigned to religious settings that are now increasingly unappealing to many. The issue may be one of culturally normed access at least as much as something psychologically nefarious in DIY spirituality or psychologically wholesome in conventional religious practice. The finding by King and colleagues that non-religious people did not show any greater vulnerability to mental disturbance than did the religious certainly suggests as much. So, too,…

What Irish Marriage Vote Means for Catholic Church; The Lonely Fight for Equality in Belize; Progress and Backlash in Tunisia; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…igning for the criminalization of sexual minorities. In Nigeria, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, and many other African countries, Roman Catholic bishops and priests—with the support of their colleagues in the U.S. and at the Vatican—have been at the forefront of anti-LGBTI campaigns. Much blame has been placed on the shoulders of conservative American evangelicals, but U.S. Roman Catholic right-wing groups are equally guilty of exporting homophobia and…

YOU Are Spiritual But Not Religious: The Secret Spiritual History of the Choose Your Own Adventure Books

By Daniel Silliman

…has emerged as a familiar, if still creative, course of explorations for many Americans.” Montgomery sought to be creative in exactly this sort of spiritual exercise. Montgomery’s CYOA plots also seems to place him more firmly in the spiritual-but-not-religious rather than secular humanist camp. The point, for Montgomery, was that whatever might exist or not exist, dealing with it would be a matter of human choices. Or, as the second Humanist Mani…

As Tensions Escalate in the Balkans, the West Could Hand Putin a Valuable Weapon

By Katherine Kelaidis

…de against Albanian Kosovars in the late 1990s. The fact is, a significant number of Serbs, and even a large number of others from traditionally Orthodox backgrounds, continue to harbor a great deal of anger about Western intervention in the Kosovo War, which they see as a failure by the West to comprehend the historical role-reversal that’s taken place, including the persecution of Orthodox Christians by Albanians and other majority-Muslim ethnic…

UPDATED: Oklahoma Personhood Bill Not Dead…

By Sarah Morice-Brubaker

…wouldn’t threaten IVF or women with life-threatening pregnancies. But many Oklahomans, and more to the point many legislators, found such lack of clarity. Sen. Doug Cox, who criticized other members of the Public Health committee for their unwillingness to put their reassurances in writing, proposed a number of amendments. So did other legislators, such that by the time SB-1433 was scheduled to be voted on, it was groaning under the weight of a…

Trump’s “Muslim Ban” A Gift to Terrorists

By Ali Olomi

…ion has done business or pursued potential deals.” There’s no evidence of any Syrian refugee committing a single act of terror in the United States, nor have there been any Iranian or Iraqi terrorists. Donald Trump’s list of banned nations is comprised of nothing more than the most vulnerable of Muslim countries, six of whom we’ve bombed or used in proxy wars. Like all bullies, he has found a soft and weak target to point his finger at. Some may t…

Census Reveals Gay People are Shockingly… Normal

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

…ike? Wild hyenas? The story that follows that headline would be just as funny if it didn’t signal the death knell for the religious right’s jihad against gays and lesbians. The article marvels that: According to the research, many same-sex couples are doing something straight couples have been doing for generations: getting older, having kids, and moving to the suburbs… These trends, both the spread of gay people living openly, and of gay populati…

Swimming Against the Tide: Religious (Non) Affiliation Might Not Mean What You Think It Means

By Timothy King

…er religion, or no religion?” while ARIS asks, “What is your religion, if any?” The Pew ask a different question: “What is your present religion, if any? Are you Protestant, Roman Catholic, Mormon, Orthodox such as Greek or Russian Orthodox, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, atheist, agnostic, something else, or nothing in particular?” Pews researchers said they believe, “by explicitly offering respondents the chance to identify as atheist, agnosti…

After More Mass Shootings It’s Time to Call Out White Supremacy in the Pews

By Peter Laarman

…what’s going on, but too few seem capable of saying it. We now have a fair number of political and civic leaders who are willing to say the word trauma and talk about the all-pervasive violence in this culture, not to mention the extent of mental disturbance and the fact that American civilians have more assault rifles in their possession than does the U.S. military. All well and good. But we have too few leaders who will talk about the deeper roo…

Dispatches from the Workplace: Postville: Ground Zero for the Intersection of Immigrant and Workers’ Rights

By Kim Bobo

…ors, dangerous conditions and insufficient safety measures. The workers, many of them undocumented immigrants, spoke to the Forward on condition of anonymity, fearing dismissal or deportation if they were identified. But their stories were backed up with on-the-record testimony and documentation from a host of clergy and community leaders, Iowa academics and union officials. The story they tell is consistent, and shocking. How AgriProcessors and i…