By Sandra Moon, RP Staff, on Mon Aug 22, 2011 at 1:30 PM ET
What do Dr. Mattson, Rev. Dr. Cook, and Rabbi Kleinbaum all have in common? They are all inspiring religious leaders, and they are all women. [Huffington Post]
 Robert Bellah, author of new book about religion's role in evolution Does Christianity in its origin support socialism or capitalism? Here are two differing views. [Washington Post]
Robert Bellah, professor emeritus of sociology at UC Berkley, is interviewed about his new book Religion in Human Evolution: From the Paleolithic to the Axial Age. [Atlantic.com]
By Artur Davis, on Wed Jul 27, 2011 at 12:30 PM ET  Based on my own observations in the House, I would have been stunned if you had told me Michele Bachmann would ever seriously contend for the presidency. Nothing about her abilities as a politician or legislator ever marked her as that kind of talent.
But it does not require sympathy for her candidacy to be repelled by the ugliness and the venom of the whispering campaign that is underway against her. It proves first, that the liberal blogosphere is as crudely toxic as the right-wing blogosphere has always been.
Second, the coverage in mainstream media of unattributed allegations from individuals with an axe to grind is a dangerous lowering of the bar. Standards still have a role to play in the coverage of a presidential race, and some of those standards are being shredded in the zeal to “unmask” Bachmann.
 I think Michele Bachmann is on the verge of opening up a sizable lead in Iowa and that she is about to become an explosive online, grassroots fund-raising force in the next several months. If she wins Iowa, there is enough of a conservative base for her to compete effectively in New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Florida.
But I am unconvinced that she can sweep those states and avoid a protracted three-month fight in the northern battleground states that she is not well-positioned to win. If Romney is still standing, he will be the choice of an establishment and a traditional donor base that doubts Bachmann’s elecability and suspects that she jeopardizes the Republican hold on the House, and the drumbeat against her general election vulnerability will take a toll.
The defining question: if Bachmann is surging early next year, is she running competitively in the polls with Barack Obama or not? If she is the nomination will be within her reach; if not it simply won’t happen.
(Cross-posted, with permission of the author, from Politico’s Arena)
By Sandra Moon, RP Staff, on Mon Jul 25, 2011 at 12:00 PM ET
The Bible as Myth–one writer explains why reading the Bible in this light has been helpful to his understanding of biblical stories. He explains that myths are not false stories, as the term is commonly understood, but that they are “a form of literature that expresses fundamental truths in a way that ordinary discourse is inadequate to describe.” [Huffington Post]
The cooperative effort between two denominations in one of the largest social service networks in the U.S., Lutheran Services in America, may come to an end over a difference in views on homosexuality and the authority of scripture. [Washington Post]
As the budget deadline approaches, faith leaders meet with Obama and ask, “What Would Jesus Cut?” [God’s Politics Blog]
Will the LGBT fight for equal standing under the law play a significant role in decriminalizing Morman polygamy? [Religion Dispatches]
By Sandra Moon, RP Staff, on Tue Jul 19, 2011 at 1:30 PM ET
Gay marriage is legal in New York, but those against it are putting up a fight. One protester explains “…based on my Christian faith and my belief in God and what the Bible teaches, I cannot and I don’t support gay lifestyles.” (Disclaimer: Not all Christians follow these beliefs, and many Christians are in fact strong advocates for LGBTQ equal rights.) [New York Times]
A man who went on a post-9/11 race-motivated killing spree is scheduled to be executed on Wednesday. One of his victims, however, is fighting against the death sentence, citing his Muslim faith as the reason. [CNN]
The Dalai Lama’s visit to Chicago sparks unity among people from several different faith traditions. [Chicago Tribune]
By Jonathan Miller, on Mon Jul 18, 2011 at 8:30 AM ET My column this week for The Huffington Post serves as tribute to a special friend of mine with a famous name and a powerful story. The “other” Diana Ross suffered an unspeakable tragedy, but she’s survived to demonstrate incredible strength and to fight for a critical cause — battling the scourge of domestic violence.
Read the excerpt below:
When my friend Terrell Ross first introduced me to his wife, I struggled to stifle a chuckle.
Diana… Ross? C’mon!
Her famous name seemed even more ironic as I came to know her. Quite in contrast to her brash diva namesake, the “other” Diana Ross was soft-spoken, kind, and demure.
Only more recently did I learn that Diana’s outward modesty belied an extraordinary inner fortitude.
In October 2006, Terrell — her beloved husband of more than three decades — died after a much-too-quick battle with a particularly pernicious and virulent strain of cancer.
And then just three years later, on September 11, 2009, her youngest daughter Amanda, aged 28, was brutally murdered by her ex-fiancé, just a few hundred yards from where Diana was gardening at her home in Lexington, Kentucky.
Because the killer, Steve Nunn, was a well-known politician — a former state legislator and gubernatorial candidate, as well as the son of a former governor — a local media melée erupted. Nunn was quickly apprehended, Amanda was buried among much pomp and circumstance, and politicians raced to introduce legislation to honor her memory.
Click here to read the full column.
By Grant Smith, RP Staff, on Wed Jul 13, 2011 at 11:00 AM ET The Politics of Generation Y Revisited On June 15th, my esteemed colleague, Zac Byer, published a thoughtful piece on generation Y’s place in the world. Most importantly, he zeroed in on Gen Y’s strong attachment to nostalgia.
Perhaps most insightful, he theorized that this attachment to nostalgia is potentially rooted in a generational fear that what lies ahead may not be as bright as what has already passed.
At risk of sounding like a pessimist, one has to wonder, “what if the pessimists have this one right?” What if Gen Y – financially speaking – is destined to end up as a new “lost generation?”
Let’s look at what is coming down the road: student loan debt that surpasses credit card debt; risk of inflation from multiple rounds of quantitative easing; the end of Social Security and Medicare as we know it; the list goes on and on.
Like the credit card shopper who splurges at the store, only to wind up with the bill months later, Gen Y is very likely to be the generation who receives the credit card bill in the mail from a previous generation or two. Unlike the credit card shopper who at least got to enjoy their products, Gen Y may get all of the tab, but none of the goods.
Read the rest of…
Grant Smith: The Politics of Gen Y Revisited – A New Lost Generation?
By Sandra Moon, RP Staff, on Mon Jul 11, 2011 at 1:30 PM ET
Shopping for a new religion? The social enterprise group The Blood Foundation has a way for you to test-drive Islam in their “Muslim for a Month” program. [BBC News]
The United Church of Christ, a denomination that has been a long time advocate for gender neutral God language, updates its bylaws to replace the term “Heavenly Father” with “Triune God,” and in doing so, draws criticism from many Christian websites. [USA Today]
The last movie in the Harry Potter series premieres in theaters this week. While some religious groups condemn the series as promoting witchcraft, others have embraced the series as promoting the ideals of love, forgiveness, and grace. Here is one article that examines Harry Potter based on Christian theology. [Huffington Post]
(For those of you who need something to tide you over until Friday, click here to watch the official trailer of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2.)
By Jonathan Miller, on Wed Jul 6, 2011 at 8:30 AM ET Two weeks ago, I shared with readers of The Recovering Politician a disturbing interview in which Kentucky GOP bigwig Larry Forgy stated his bizarre and pernicious theory that Jews such as George Soros, Barbra Streisand and Steve Spielberg would be pumping in significant loads of cash to support their co-religionist, Jerry Abramson, in his bid for Lieutenant Governor.
The RP Nation responded with outrage — dozens of your comments and emails unanimously denounced Forgy’s slur.
As far as the Kentucky mainstream media…well…the response was much more muted. It took two weeks for one of the state’s leading newspapers to issue a condemnation, and it did not even address the most offensive remarks. The other editorial page — from the very paper that broke the story — has been atypically silent.
I share my own views about the media response — as well as my belief that it is incumbent on all of us to denounce intolerance whenever it rears its ugly head — in my column this week in The Huffington Post:
My bet is that is that it was a conscious decision [by the media] to deprive oxygen to the flames of anti-Semitism. I suppose they believe that ignoring the issue and refusing to publish the more outrageous accusations will prevent them from being repeated and then accepted in areas of the state where latent anti-Semitism could be transformed into something much worse. Hopefully if this is the case, the rest of the media, as well as the state Republican party, will get the message and send Forgy off to permanent pasture.
But if the 20th Century taught us anything about the proper response to anti-Semitism, it is that we must confront it whenever it raises its ugly head. As I argued in this column two weeks ago, we no longer need to be afraid that this sort of anti-Semitism would be welcomed in this country, even in the rural, conservative Bible Belt. Indeed, by exposing and then denouncing language such as Forgy’s, we help reinforce the message now emanating from rural, evangelical churches — to love their Jewish neighbors.
To read my full column, click here.
By Sandra Moon, RP Staff, on Tue Jul 5, 2011 at 1:30 PM ET
Fourth of July Spirituality: One church leader suggests six spiritual practices for this holiday. The goals of these practices are to affirm and celebrate this day of our nation’s birth, while imagining the “impossible possibility” of justice, planetary health, and Shalom for the larger world. [Patheos.com]
For many Americans, this holiday weekend involved cookouts and picnics with copious amounts of food. This article challenges us to eat mindfully as a spiritual experience to “Give[e] us a deep appreciation of all that went into the meal’s creation as well a deep understanding of the relationship between the food on our table, our own health and our planet’s health.” [Huffington Post]
Freedom of religious belief is one of the core values of the U.S. On this day celebrating our nation’s birth, however, some claim that they feel alienated and face accusations of being anti-American because of their lack of belief in God. [CNN Belief Blog]
With the Pope’s first tweet, the Vatican embraces social media. [BBC News]
By Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, on Tue Jul 5, 2011 at 8:30 AM ET  I recently attended an event for a group called Catholic Democrats in Indianapolis and then visited Thomas Merton’s monastery in Kentucky. In just a few days, I moved from the excitement of current politics to the more tranquil world of contemplation and theology. This inspiring week reminded me that Catholicism is not a narrow-minded religion but a universal church encompassing many ways to reach God.
The event I attended in Indianapolis was a joint fundraiser for Catholic Democrats and the Democratic candidate for mayor, Melina Kennedy (no relation). Now 16,000 strong, Catholic Democrats was founded by Patrick Whelan, a rheumatologist at Massachusetts General Hospital. Like me, he felt that Catholics who were focused on a single issue—abortion—were eroding the Church’s tradition of working for the common good.
For the past 20 years or so, it seemed that the Church hierarchy was in cahoots with the Republican party, insisting that good Catholics vote Republican. In 2004, some bishops came out and said it would be sinful to vote for John Kerry, given his pro-choice views. When I campaigned in Iowa during the 2008 presidential primaries, high school students told me that they felt they’d have to go to confession after voting for a pro-choice Democrat.
This inspiring week reminded me that Catholicism is not a narrow-minded religion but a universal church encompassing many ways to reach God.
Since then, a number of groups have begun to protest the hijacking of Catholic teachings by the conservative right. In May, when John Boehner gave the graduation address at Catholic University, more than 75 prominent Catholic academics sent him a letter that said, “From the apostles to the present, the Magisterium of the Church has insisted that those in power are morally obliged to preference the needs of the poor.” They added, “Your record in support of legislation to address the desperate needs of the poor is among the worst in Congress.”
Read the rest of…
Kathleen Kennedy Townsend: America’s Progressive Catholics
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