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New Research Links Spiritual-Not-Religious to Mental Disorder

By Elizabeth Drescher

…specially those with a particular engagement with nature, as University of Florida professor Bron Taylor has argued with regard to surfing and fly fishing. Zumba and Pilates classes in otherwise empty church halls notwithstanding, the reverse in terms of physical benefit is not typically the case with religious practice. Musick and Worthen likewise question glowing findings on religion and well-being by highlighting often ignored negative effects…

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

…publicly buck the church. Raw Story cited post-election comments from Tony Flannery, a Redemptorist priest who was stripped of his ministry in 2012 for his outspoken views on contraception and the ordination of women. “The last thing the Irish bishops should be doing is further alienating the young generation who the Church, to a fair degree, has lost already,” said Flannery. The impact of the vote could extend well beyond Ireland. The vote was ce…

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

By Daniel Silliman

…acterization of the spiritual-but-not-religious person is of someone a bit flighty and unserious. The spirituality is a pastiche of confused and conflicting ideas. The seeker is typically thought of as embracing a mishmash of conflicting ideas—Catholicism and reincarnation, Buddhism and crystals, kitschy angels and dreamcatchers—which, if taken seriously as ideas, would not seem to fit together. For Montgomery, however, joining spiritual individua…

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

By Katherine Kelaidis

…ts is the very opening that Russia is looking for when it seeks to wield influence in places like Serbia, where people are not necessarily thrilled at the prospect of Russian domination, but where there’s deep mistrust of a West that seems completely unaware of the historical memories at play. And Russia has been more than happy to fill the gap. Russian propaganda network RT recently launched a local website and broadcaster in Serbia. Offering a m…

UPDATED: Oklahoma Personhood Bill Not Dead…

By Sarah Morice-Brubaker

…of maneuvering which, if signed by enough legislators, would have forced a floor vote over the objections of the Speaker and Floor Leader. Well, how well do you think that endeared the bill’s supporters to the party leadership? I suppose one has to consider the possibility that Speaker Steele and Floor Leader Dewitt are superhuman in their charity. Perhaps Speaker Steele was utterly unmoved by being insulted in a press release. Perhaps the Republi…

Trump’s “Muslim Ban” A Gift to Terrorists

By Ali Olomi

…other. ISIS propaganda calls the US an unsafe place for Muslims. Refugees fleeing from ISIS need somewhere to flee to. By banning refugees, Donald Trump vilifies the victims, deliberately conflating them with the perpetrators. ISIS is achieving its aims: a nationless population it can absorb into its nascent and brutal state, with an America that has given proof to their propaganda. Donald Trump’s words have already been featured in ISIS recruitm…

Census Reveals Gay People are Shockingly… Normal

By Candace Chellew-Hodge

According to new census figures, the number of people reporting that they are living with a same-sex partner has risen 52 percent in the last decade. That’s almost 902,000 people who are living all across the United States. Even here in my own incredibly conservative state of South Carolina, the number of same-sex couples increased and a quarter of them are raising children. It’s those kinds of facts that have right-wing media like the Christian…

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

By Timothy King

…Photo by Cathleen Falsani. The Decline of Christendom Obviously, from the numbers and the tales they tell, American Christianity is hardly experiencing a Renaissance. But the rise of the “nones” does not equal its wide-scale collapse, either. A better description might be that we are witnessing the decline of “Christendom.” In this sense” Christendom” refers to the broader assumptions we imbibe, often without being fully aware, as a result of the…

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

By Peter Laarman

…ental 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 roots of these things or attempt to explain why American culture is “exceptional”—exceptional in its toxicity, that is. A growing number of truth telling historians are eager to help us discover these deeper roots if we are willing to listen. H…

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

By Kim Bobo

…like most he interviewed, did not really understand what a Social Security number was. He certainly wasn’t trying to steal someone else’s credit. He was supporting his children, wife, mother and sister. When interviewed, he wept. The day after the arrests, Postville was in chaos. Families took refuge at St. Bridget’s Catholic Church. A third of the elementary and middle-school children were absent from school, traumatizing both immigrant children…