Lauren Ashley, self-proclaimed Miss Beverly Hills, now rejected by Hills officials, is drawing more media attention as an oracle than anyone else since another would-be Beauty Queen, Carrie Prejean, spoke. Both commented on homosexuality. We news-scanners find issues connected with it to be the most
Religion-in-public news recently featured a Pew poll that demonstrated how many Americans mix faiths. More on that in some other week. Recent news stories raise a screech question: Will there long be faiths to mix in America? “Faiths” here means bodies of believers, gathered in
On May 4, 2009 the BBC’s top stories included the headline “‘Gay man’ disinterred in Senegal.” The article told how a gay man died and was buried in a Muslim cemetery, only to be disinterred twice. In the first instance his body was left outside
The top ecumenical – some are saying un- or anti-ecumenical – news of the year occurred October 20th with a Vatican announcement. Bypassing forty years of Anglican-Roman Catholic conversations-cum-negotiations and blindsiding Archbishop Rowan Williams, the head of the seventy-million-member Anglican Communion, Vatican officials announced that
Annually I write the report on “Protestantism” for World Book and other yearbooks. For a dozen or score of years now, the lead story always has to be about churches tearing themselves apart in lose-lose battles over the blessing of gay marriages and ordination of
One of the most popular biblical translations among evangelical conservatives is the New International Version. Introduced in 1978, and immediately endorsed by Billy Graham, the NIV has sold over 300 million copies. As of 2011 the NIV is scheduled for an update. Editors argue that
Columnist Frank Rich in the New York Times recently joined the company of those who note, as his headline says, that “The Culture Warriors Get Laid Off.” He wrote of the “upside to the economic meltdown,” one which allows citizens to get serious now about
A recent article in The Atlantic and recently released Lutheran documents give good reasons to revisit the status of gays and lesbians across American society. Unfortunately, few commentators to date have addressed the most troubling development of the past few years: the growth of DOMA
Did you know that there is a Religious Institute on Sexual Morality, Justice and Healing? On Thursday, January 8, the Institute, together with Union Theological Seminary in New York, issued a fifty-two page report, which is a call for North American Theological Seminaries to offer
It is by now old news – or should be – that evangelical Christians have developed a social conscience that goes beyond wedge issues like abortion and gay rights. Some are even (gasp!) registered Democrats. In (the September 2008) issue of Books and Culture(put out