NewsTrust - Christianity - Most Recent Stories: Opinion (Mainstream)

Unitarians are far from wishy-washy

Fri, 30 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

The Guardian - By Rose McDonagh - Sep. 30 (Opinion) - In Springfield Missouri, The First Unitarian Universalist Church flies a rainbow flag to represent equality. "Every few months our flag is stolen, we have had graffiti written on our sidewalk and steps, and outdoor lights broken," Linda, the church administrator, tells me in an email. Sometimes, those angry at the congregation's stance on social issues have taken the bizarre step of turning up at the church and placing fake money in the collection plate scrawled with racist or homophobic notes. "I have a wallet full of them."

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Sudan split was 'over-simplified' by media

Sun, 10 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Aljazeera - By Ali M Latifi - Jul. 10 (Opinion) - For many directly affected by the world's longest-running civil war, the Sudanese conflict has been over-simplified in the Western press as inter-religious or inter-ethnic strife. "The media tried to make us look like Jafar in Aladdin," says Khalid Albaih, a Sudanese political cartoonist. "Everyone looks alike [in Sudan], the Arabs and the Africans," he adds. John Prendergast, human rights activist and co-founder of the Enough project, told Al Jazeera: "One should not overplay this idea of north versus south or Christian versus Muslim." While Moez Ali, a Sudanese blogger and political commentator, said the conflict was an issue of disenfranchisement of a people "who were never given an agenda in the government" throughout the nation's 55-year history. Since independence in 1956, "a small group of people in power in Khartoum used race and religion to divide and conquer," says Prendergast. This conflict was further exacerbated in 2004 when the Khartoum government, headed by Omar al-Bashir, made a bid to control the oil and water resources of the south, he adds.

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My Take: Jesus would believe in evolution and so should you

Sun, 10 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

CNN - By Karl W. Giberson - Apr. 10 (Opinion) - Jesus once famously said, “I am the Truth.” Christianity at its best embodies this provocative idea and has long been committed to preserving, expanding and sharing truth. Most of the great universities of the world were founded by Christians committed to the truth—in all its forms—and to training new generations to carry it forward. When science began in the 17th century, Christians eagerly applied the new knowledge to alleviate suffering and improve living conditions. But when it comes to the truth of evolution, many Christians feel compelled to look the other way. They hold on to a particular interpretation of an ancient story in Genesis that they have fashioned into a modern account of origins - a story that began as an oral tradition for a wandering tribe of Jews thousands of years ago. This is the view on display in a $27 million dollar Creation Museum in Kentucky. It inspired the Institute for Creation Research, which purports to offer scientific support for creationism.

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The enduring goodness of Japan

Thu, 07 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Christian Science Monitor - By Lisa Troseth - Apr. 07 (Opinion) - A Christian Science perspective: Rebuilding in Japan with inspiration, resilience, and hope.

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Faith and Modernity

Sat, 25 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0800

New York Times - By Alan Wolfe - Dec. 25 (Review) - Yule as we celebrate it today owes more to Charles Dickens than to Thomas Aquinas. Our major solstice holiday is what Roy calls a “cultural construct” rather than a sectarian ceremony, which explains why Muslims buy halal turkeys and Jews transformed Hanukkah into a gift-giving occasion. Mistakenly believing that Christmas is sacred, those who defend it find themselves propping up the profane. The Christ they want in Christmas is a product not of Nazareth but of Madison Avenue.

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The Tolerance Canard

Fri, 22 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Denver Post - By David Harsanyi - Oct. 22 (Opinion) - Today, even broaching the topic of religious affiliation can send (almost all) the dolts on "The View" scattering for cover. To some folks, any whiff of critical discussion on the religious angle is tantamount to narrow-mindedness. And now, apparently, religious bigotry includes the dissemination of truth.

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A miracle! Science claims it has figured out how sea was parted for Israelites

Tue, 21 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

The Guardian - By Suzanne Goldenberg - Sep. 21 (Opinion) - Researchers reconstruct wind and wave combinations that could have produced dry path across sea described in Exodus. It was a miracle of the ages, the parting of the Red Sea for the Israelites. Now modern science is claiming a feat that if true is almost as miraculous – figuring out how Moses may have done it and where.

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We are the Tea Party

Tue, 21 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By John Mark Reynolds - Sep. 21 (Opinion) - Americans have never been fond of taxes: ask the British. Parliament passed a tiny tax on tea and touched off a titanic tax rebellion. Americans may like some government social programs, but they don't like paying for them. Ronald Reagan once summed up our attitude by saying: "Don't tax you, don't tax me, tax that fellow behind the tree."

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The State of Islam in America

Tue, 14 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

This Week - By Christiane Amanpour - Sep. 14 (Interview) - Eboo Patel, Irshad Manji and Rev. Richard Cizik discuss Islam in America.

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September 13, 2010 - Ben Affleck

Mon, 13 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Daily Show - By Jon Stewart - Sep. 13 (Comedy News) - Terry Jones listens to God, Fox News hears a threat from Imam Rauf, and Ben Affleck applies for a job.

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Mormons, Evangelicals and Glenn Beck

Mon, 30 Aug 2010 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Ross Douthat - Aug. 30 (Opinion) - I don’t know if the Fox News host actually has any soul-winning ambitions. But you could, if you were so inclined, regard him as a kind of ecumenical outreach coordinator, working to burnish Mormonism’s image among conservative evangelicals.

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Newly published "modesty survey" for Christian youth lays bare evangelical fetishes

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Baltimore Examiner - Jul. 30 (Opinion) - The youth movement Rebelution has published the results of an in-house survey that is meant to be a 128 question guide for Christian women on how to best live and dress in a godly fashion. In actuality it's a rare peak beneath the veil of Christian rock "worship" services and their desperate grab for modern relevancy, revealing a deep seated sexual insecurity, waiting to be harnessed patriarchy and the rolling back of sixty years worth of women's power.

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Add a link to Google Reader

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 00:00:00 -0700

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Sister Margaret’s Choice

Thu, 27 May 2010 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Nicholas D. Kristof - May. 27 (Opinion) - The recent excommunication of a nun who saved a mother’s life underscores a perception problem of the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy. We finally have a case where the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy is responding forcefully and speedily to allegations of wrongdoing. But the target isn’t a pedophile priest. Rather, it’s a nun who helped save a woman’s life. Doctors describe her as saintly. The excommunication of Sister Margaret McBride in Phoenix underscores all that to me feels morally obtuse about the church hierarchy. I hope that a public outcry can rectify this travesty. Sister Margaret was a senior administrator of St. Joseph’s Hospital in Phoenix. A 27-year-old mother of four arrived late last year, in her third month of pregnancy. According to local news reports and accounts from the hospital and some of its staff members, the mother suffered from a serious complication called pulmonary hypertension. That created a high probability that the strain of continuing pregnancy would kill her. “In this tragic case, the treatment necessary to save the mother’s life required the termination of an 11-week pregnancy,” the hospital said in a statement. “This decision was made after consultation with the patient, her family, her physicians, and in consultation with the Ethics Committee.”

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Op-Ed Contributor: Many Faiths, One Truth

Tue, 25 May 2010 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Tenzin Gyatso - May. 25 (Opinion) - Though every religion has a sense of exclusivity as part of its core identity, there is genuine potential for mutual understanding.

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Supreme Court ruling on crucifix displays conservative hypocrisy

Fri, 30 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Baltimore Examiner - By Marc Rubin - Apr. 30 (Opinion) - In a narrow 5-4 decision sending the case back to a lower court, the 5 conservative members of the Supreme Court overturned a lower court ruling that a crucifix erected on government land in the Mojave Desert to honor war dead did not violate the first amendment "establishment" clause meant to prevent any government endorsement of a religion. But the hypocrisy of the reasoning was apparent in deciding the case on ideological not constitutional grounds. In the opinion, written by Justice Kennedy for the majority, he wrote that the first amendment calls for a "middle ground policy of accommodation regarding religious symbols." There is of course no mention of a middle ground on anything in the first amendment, and and the hypocrisy of the reasoning is brazen because conservatives, including those on the court, who rail against Roe v.Wade, do so because they say the basis for the decision -- that there is a constitutional right to privacy -- doesn't exist in the constitution.

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John Paul II and Benedict XVI: The Better Pope?

Mon, 12 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Ross Douthat - Apr. 12 (Opinion) - Pope John Paul II let scandals spread beneath his feet, and the uncharismatic Benedict XVI was left to clean them up.

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The Church’s Judas Moment

Wed, 07 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Maureen Dowd - Apr. 07 (Opinion) - A brother’s solemn thoughts on the crisis in the Catholic Church.

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Pope Benedict has a duty to act forcefully on church abuse

Fri, 02 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By Eugene Robinson - Apr. 02 (Opinion) - At its holiest time of the year, the Roman Catholic Church is being forced to confront not only the central mystery of the faith -- life after death -- but also a more worldly riddle: What did the Holy Father know, and when did he know it?

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Nuns Back Bill Amid Broad Rift Over Whether It Limits Abortion Enough

Sat, 20 Mar 2010 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Helene Cooper - Mar. 20 (Opinion) - A divide over how tightly to restrict federal subsidies for insurance policies that cover abortion was proving central to the health care debate.

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'They Need to Be Liberated From Their God'

Sat, 06 Mar 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Wall Street Journal - By Matthew Kaminski - Mar. 06 (Interview) - The 'Son of Hamas' author on his conversion to Christianity, spying for Israel, and shaming his family.

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Learning From the Sin of Sodom

Sun, 28 Feb 2010 00:00:00 -0800

New York Times - By Nicholas D. Kristof - Feb. 28 (Opinion) - Evangelicals have become the new internationalists, pushing successfully for new American programs against AIDS and malaria, and doing superb work on issues from human trafficking in India to mass rape in Congo.

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Republicans v secular America | Dan Kennedy

Wed, 24 Feb 2010 00:00:00 -0800

The Guardian - By Dan Kennedy - Feb. 24 (Opinion) - If you're part of secular America – that is, if you're an atheist, an agnostic, a religious liberal or even a mainstream believer who thinks religion should be kept out of politics and vice-versa – then you should be very afraid of what the Republican party has in store for you in 2012.

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Suffering

Mon, 18 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

New Yorker - By George Packer - Jan. 18 (Comment) - The night after the earthquake, Haitians who had lost their homes, or who feared that their houses might collapse, slept outdoors, in the streets and parks of Port-au-Prince. In Place Saint-Pierre, across the street from the Kinam Hotel, in the suburb of Pétionville, hundreds of people lay under the sky, and many of them sang hymns: “God, you are the one who gave me life. Why are we suffering?”

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In the name of religion

Wed, 05 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Dawn - By Yaqoob Khan Bangash - Aug. 05 (Opinion) - This month we will be commemorating for the 62nd year running the carnage which engulfed the subcontinent in the name of religion — violence in the name of religion refuses to dissipate.

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