Religion Dispatches
…On the eve of the Pope’s address to congress, RD Senior Correspondent Patti Miller spoke with NPR partner station KPCC about the effect on the culture wars of “[t]he most politicized pontiff in contemporary history.” https://soundcloud.com/religion-dispatches/papal-politics-how-pope-francis-stirs-the-culture-wars-in-dc…
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…greement.” What is antisemitism, and who is an antisemite? The issue has become important, yet again, because the upcoming Women’s March has been derailed due precisely to this very conundrum. The controversy centers around a figure, Louis Farrakhan, who as leader of the Nation of Islam (NOI) has repeatedly and overtly espoused views of Jew-hatred that one could unequivocally call antisemitic. But he’s not really the issue, since he has nothing to…
Read More…d, “I know the cast of characters and their highly dubious reputations and complete lack of expertise when it comes to Islam, Muslims, and national security.” “What I would assert is really at play here is good old fashioned bigotry,” he continued, and “some are making a decent living on this,” referring to the Tennessean’s revelations about Emerson. As to the particular assertions in the Fox piece, Khan noted that the CMSA didn’t exist when peopl…
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…The sea change is captured in FRC President Tony Perkins’ response to the Compassion Forum. Despite the fact that the Compassion Forum was hosted at an evangelical college (Messiah College) and that prominent evangelicals such as the president of the Southern Baptist Convention and the vice president of the National Association of Evangelicals were on the Compassion Forum Board (Perkins himself was invited but did not respond), Perkins issued a l…
Read More…al about what he knows can only make Palin nervous. The tit-for-tat snarky comments between Palin and Johnston are both funny and sad, and the tantalizing “there are some things that I know (about Sarah) that are HUGE” is a scimitar hanging over Palin’s carefully coiffed hair. His recent comment that Palin called her down syndrome baby “retarded” is either a big FAIL on his part, or an indictment of her mothering skills. No matter what he says for…
Read More…coverage concludes that Beck is, at best, “bonkers.” Alex Pareene of Salon.com, however, realizes that perhaps this is not “some sort of victory”; that leaving Fox is not the end of Beck, but rather that his legacy might not be as a talking head but as an amateur historian, the creator of Beck University, with a clear, and popular, articulation of nation. The tagline for BU promises, “learn history as it really happened” with David Barton responsi…
Read More…ces!” he said. “What great richness this diversity is, a diversity which becomes complimentary, but also reciprocal. It binds them, one to the other.” “Children mature seeing their father and mother like this; their identity matures being confronted with the love their father and mother have, confronted with this difference,” he said. Italy: Large protest in Rome against marriage equality Hundreds of thousands of protesters gathered in Rome on Sat…
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…onspirituality, and there are some in the wellness, yoga, and spirituality communities who have become deeply concerned about the interpenetration of the two. When asked by the Arizona Republic about where he got his ideas, Jake Angeli mentioned “internet research” and Behold a Pale Horse by William Cooper. Cooper was another Arizona resident, killed by police, whose book went on to influence QAnon and the right-wing Patriot movement. YouTube rese…
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…ming Out is a Death Sentence’ The International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission published this week “When Coming Out is a Death Sentence,” a report on the persecution of LGBT Iraqis, and “We’re Here: Iraqi LGBT People’s Accounts of Violence and Rights Abuses.” From IGLHRC: LGBT people in Iraq have long been persecuted. But the rising tide of turmoil today puts many at imminent risk of death. The Islamic State prescribes death for the “practi…
Read More…dments on display in front of the Bradford County Courthouse. How did this come about? As reported by news4jax.com: American Atheists had sued to have the aforementioned Ten Commandments monument taken down, and in an effort to mediate, the county asked the monument’s sponsoring group, the Community Men’s Fellowship, to remove it—but the group refused. Rather than incur the expense involved in dismantling this 5-foot, 6-ton stone slab, Bradford Co…
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