Religion Dispatches
…eft a pool of blue stood with heads bowed. As a person of faith and in the ordination process of a mainline denomination, I was drawn to this group that stood outside, enduring the late afternoon heat, with hearts and petitions lifted up to the divine. But I was afraid they’d see my presence as either an invasion or provocation. I regret that I didn’t at least try to bridge that damn chasm. Instead, I plopped down on the nearest bench. Right acros…
Read More…well aware that good Catholics can part company with the hierarchy on any number of issues, including abortion. Catholics represent about 23% of the American population, so they are obviously a significant voting bloc with a chunk in the middle that are crucial swing voters. But the quest to satisfy them by bending to the bishops or straining to be “friendly” to religion is not only misguided, but undemocratic. According to the Pew Religious Land…
Read More…to identify myself within a queer narrative was the fact that there were a number of different narratives available to me. Identifying as an atheist, I went through a similar process, but there weren’t the same range of narratives. And I kept meeting other atheists who felt the same way I did—who felt like their identities and their stories weren’t represented in the most dominant atheist narratives. How would you characterize narrative American…
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…mption”); Redemption is the name of a heavy metal band, and the title of a number of record albums including one by the metal group Vomitory, and the hip hop duo GRITS; “Redemption” was the title of a two-part episode on television’s “Stargate SG-1,” and also of a “Star Trek: The Next Generation” two-parter. “Redemption Song” was one of many of Bob Marley’s extraordinary musical contributions, and if you haven’t seen The Shawshank Redemption, rent…
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…ge how they understand their own identity. If academic achievement and the number or type of initials after your name is the most important thing in the world to you, then it will change how you view your own masculinity and femininity. Similarly, if having children matters most to you, then you can only be truly “manly” or “feminine” if you have kids. Is there anything you had to leave out? Historians always want to include every interesting anec…
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…ng in our churches. Catholic theologian M. Shawn Copeland offers profound words to any individuals and churches seeking to wash their hands of this issue. She states, If my sister or brother is not at the table, we are not the flesh of Christ. If my sister’s mark of sexuality must be obscured, if my brother’s mark of race must be disguised, if my sister’s mark of culture must be repressed, then we are not the flesh of Christ. For, it is through an…
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…and Fall of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker’s Evangelical Empire John Wigger Oxford UP August 2017 What’s the most important take-home message for readers? PTL helps to explain the persistent connections between religion and popular culture in American life, a connection that runs deeper than politics alone. PTL grew so quickly because of its embrace of consumer and celebrity culture, much of it through the prosperity gospel, but along the way the mone…
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…put on to move undetected in a society that refuses to overturn the racist order but considers the N-word to be taboo. Those who’ve shown historical hostility to Black life are invited to the table to determine our fates as long as they name their Negrophobia “the conservative perspective”—as long as they keep on their hats. Of course, such a threadbare disguise fools no one who hasn’t a vested interest in being fooled. Anti-Blackness is laundered…
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…while Bebbington explores the recent history of British evangelicalism in order to highlight the peculiar nature of the American scene. Evangelicalism is now a global phenomenon, the editors conclude, and the troubling features of any particular part of the movement should not distract us from the integrity of the whole. Noll even ends the collection with yet another metaphorical flourish, suggesting that scholars no longer think of evangelicalis…
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…inuing research on this community may be done in a more thoughtful way. Accordingly, any theory used in the book has been broken down into clear terms that will be useful to undergraduates. I believe that as public intellectuals, academics should not hide their ideas behind specialized vocabulary and neologisms. I also anticipate that many readers will be vampires themselves. Every book and academic article that has ever been written on vampires h…
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