Religion Dispatches
The faith of Jason Collins, who recently came out as the first gay athlete in a major American sport, doesn’t fit the model of culture war conflicts the media expects and the religious right demands of its spokespeople.
Read MoreThe latest bloggingheads.
Read MoreCan America’s favorite celebrity Christian rebrand Southern Baptists?
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Two unlikely heroes, Tim Tebow and Jeremy Lin, have rocked the sports world. Lurking behind their stardom is a whole lot of bad theology.
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People are watching The Tebow Show because he’s a second-rate quarterback… and winning games, often against great odds while playing his best at the most opportune times. For a large segment of the population (43 percent according to a recent poll), Tebow’s success is proof that God intervenes in history, even in football games.
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Besides the weighty matters of truth, justice and protection, Coach Brown prayed for something much less obviously connected to the alleged sexual abuse: a restoration of masculinity to the game of football.
“There are a lot of little boys around the country, today, who are watching this game. And they’re trying to figure out what the definition of manhood is all about. Father, this is it right here. I pray that this game will be a training ground of what manhood looks like.”
When I heard that prayer I couldn’t help but ask, why here and why now? What is it exactly about this scandal that relates to little boys trying to learn what manhood looks like?
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My mother might not be Tim Tebow’s most typical fan, but she shares many traits with the growing throngs of people who make up his already vast fan base. She breaks the mold in terms of geography and football knowledge. She is from Canada, not the American South, and before I started attending the University of Florida as a doctoral student in religion, she had never been concerned with anyone’s “throwing accuracy,” nor would she have known that it is tough for a running quarterback to make it in the passing-dominated NFL. She is, though, an evangelical Christian and that qualifies her for Tebowmania—even if only via internet connections in Canada.
Read MoreThe week in religion, poetically.
Read MoreStrippers and Churchgoers at odds, Rand Paul and Aqua Buddha, Tim Tebow and his monk’s hairdo.
Read MoreWhether Dobson was forced out or not, a “new face” has been in the cards.
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