Evangelicals

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The Religion Guy (as usual) dissents somewhat on the votes for 2023's top religion stories

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The Religion Guy (as usual) dissents somewhat on the votes for 2023's top religion stories

When it comes to religion news, what ultimately mattered in 2023?

Colleagues in the Religion News Association (RNA) divided their annual choices of the year's top stories into two categories. Incidents of hatred against Jews and Muslims ranked number one in U.S. matters, while the related Israel-Hamas war led international items. Thirdly, Pope Francis was deemed the year’s top newsmaker in religion for the fourth time.

It’s hard to argue against the two top stories, but The Guy observes that we have no idea whether U.S. hatreds are a temporary sickness that will subside, or whether anything can really alter the essential questions in the decades-long Mideast conflict. Thus, The Guy leans toward the importance of permanent changes in direction as depicted below.

he results of the RNA members’ poll were released just before Monday’s revolutionary “declaration” from the Vatican’s doctrine agency, following frequent nudges from Pope Francis, that lets priests provide blessing ceremonies for same-sex couples and for Catholics in “irregular” situations, presumably meaning those divorced and remarried.

The Church of England’s parallel approval for same-sex blessings, implemented the day before the new Vatican edict, gravely worsened this year’s split over marriage and sexuality among Anglicans worldwide, a divide that has been widening for decades.

Several important stories are ongoing and we cannot yet judge their long-term import.


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Podcast: How long to sing this song? Yes, we have another (M.I.A.) 'equal access' story

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Podcast: How long to sing this song? Yes, we have another (M.I.A.) 'equal access' story

How long to sing this song? Audible sigh.

How often, during GetReligion’s nearly 20 years online, have your GetReligionistas critiqued church-state stories about public schools, libraries and other state-funded facilities in which officials were wrestling with “equal access” guidelines — but it was clear that journalists didn’t know (or didn’t care) that they were covering an “equal access” story?

That was the Big Idea that loomed (once again) over this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (CLICK HERE to tune that in). Before we jump into this new case study, let’s do a flashback into a few recent “equal access” headlines at GetReligion:

* “Washington Post looks at 'school choice' bills, and (#surprise) omits 'equal access' info.”

* “Another SCOTUS win for 'equal access,' whether most journalists realized this or not.”

* “Fellowship of Christian Athletes wins an 'equal access' case, even if LATimes missed that.”

* “Reminder to journalists (again): Private schools — left, right — can defend their core doctrines.”

For starters, what are we talking about here? Let’s flash back to a summary that I have used in posts more than once. Sorry for the echo-chamber effect, but that’s kind of the point of this post:

What we keep seeing is a clash between two different forms of “liberalism,” with that term defined into terms of political science instead of partisan politics.

Some justices defend a concept of church-state separation that leans toward the secularism of French Revolution liberalism. The goal is for zero tax dollars to end up in the checkbooks of citizens who teach or practice traditional forms of religious doctrine (while it’s acceptable to support believers whose approach to controversial issues — think sin and salvation — mirror those of modernity).

Then there are justices who back “equal access” concepts articulated by a broad, left-right coalition that existed in the Bill Clinton era. The big idea: Religious beliefs are not a uniquely dangerous form of speech and action and, thus, should be treated in a manner similar to secular beliefs and actions. If states choose to use tax dollars to support secular beliefs and practices, they should do the same for religious beliefs and practices.

At some point, it would be constructive of journalists spotted these “equal access” concepts and traced them to back to their roots in the Clinton era (and earlier). But maybe I am being overly optimistic.

Once again, the Bill Clinton era wasn't about throwing red meat to the Religious Right. Instead, you had old-school First Amendment liberals trying — more often than not — to find ways to prevent “viewpoint discrimination” in the use of public funds and facilities.


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Let us attend: Mark Kellner offers readers a visit from the ghost of church-state past

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Let us attend: Mark Kellner offers readers a visit from the ghost of church-state past

Every now and then, religion-beat readers are granted a visitation from the ghost of church-state past.

In this case, we are dealing with a Washington Times report by former GetReligionista Mark Kellner, who has spent enough time inside the D.C. Beltway to understand that mass transit is the true public square for most citizens.

Thus, spot the classic church-state ghost in this headline: “Christian group, ACLU sue Metro over rejected bus ads featuring a praying George Washington.”

Need a hint? Who were some of the major players in the broad coalition that backed the near-unanimous votes in the U.S. Congress for the Religious Freedom Restoration Act in 1993?

OK, here is Kellner’s overture:

A Texas-based Christian education group has filed a free-speech lawsuit backed by the ACLU over the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority‘s rejection of the group’s ads that feature images of a praying George Washington.

WMATA earlier this year rejected the ads from WallBuilders, an Aledo, Texas, organization founded by evangelical author David Barton to communicate “the moral, religious, and constitutional foundation” of the United States. The ads would have been displayed on Metro buses.

Wallbuilders was joined in the suit by the American Civil Liberties Union and its D.C. chapter, the First Liberty Institute and the law firm of Steptoe LLP.

Wait a minute. The ACLU and a conservative Christian group are on the same side in a First Amendment free speech/religious liberty case?

Of course, there was a time when this kind of broad church-state coalition was common, as in the RFRA era. But, these days, it’s tempting to think that this kind of First Amendment logic can only be achieved with the help of a time machine (or a case involving a small, sympathetic religious minority group).


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Finding religion ghosts in the Ivy League wars, with help (sort of) from Andrew Sullivan

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Finding religion ghosts in the Ivy League wars, with help (sort of) from Andrew Sullivan

If you have been following the horror shows at Ivy League schools, you know how agonizing this situation has become for old-school First Amendment liberals.

Are the tropes of anti-Semitism still protected forms of speech? Back in the 1970s, ACLU lawyers knew the painful answer to that question when Nazis wanted to legally march through Skokie, Illinois, a Chicago-area community containing many Holocaust survivors.

America has come a long way, since then. Today, the illiberal world considers a stunning amount of free speech to be violence, except in myriad cases in which speech controls are used to prevent “hate speech” and misinformation/disinformation in debates when one side controls the public space in which free debates are supposed to be taking place.

Clearly, death threats, physical intimidation and assaults are out of line. But what about a slogan such as, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free”? Is that automatically a call for genocide? The Associated Press has this to say:

Many Palestinian activists say it’s a call for peace and equality after 75 years of Israeli statehood and decades-long, open-ended Israeli military rule over millions of Palestinians. Jews hear a clear demand for Israel’s destruction.

Ah, but what does Hamas say? The same AP report notes:

“Palestine is ours from the river to the sea and from the south to the north,” Khaled Mashaal, the group’s former leader, said that year [2012] in a speech in Gaza celebrating the 25th anniversary of the founding of Hamas. “There will be no concession on any inch of the land.”

The phrase also has roots in the Hamas charter.

The key is that Hamas opposes a two-state solution allowing Israel to continue as a Jewish homeland. How is Israel eliminated without the eliminating, to one degree or another, millions of Jews?

This brings us back to the Ivy League. At this point, I think that it’s time for someone to ask if other minorities on Ivy League campuses have — in recent decades — experienced severe limitations on their free speech and freedom of association. To what degree are other minorities “ghosts” on these campuses? Do they barely exist? Has the rush to “diversity” eliminated many religious and cultural points of view?

Ah, but the Ivy League giants are private schools. They have rights of their own.


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Question for Isaac Newton: Is religious faith compatible with scientific thinking?

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Question for Isaac Newton: Is religious faith compatible with scientific thinking?

QUESTION:
Is religious faith compatible with scientific thinking?

THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER:

The question above was the headline with a November 14 PsychologyToday.com article by Joseph Pierre, a clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of California, San Francisco — the latest of so many that address this perennial issue.

His answer was yes or no, depending. Atheists may say no, period. As we’ll see, many prominent scientists have replied with a yes.

Pierre explains that “many of our beliefs are difficult, and sometimes impossible, to falsify,” and religion seeks to offer satisfactory answers for many such scientific “unknowns.”

Examples: Does God exist? What happens when we die? With these kinds of inevitable questions humans ask, faith believes “in the absence of evidence” as science understands that term.

In his outlook, the best way to hold faith-based beliefs is to acknowledge “the possibility of being wrong” and allow “room for others to have different beliefs” without confusing faith with “absolute truth.” But, needless to say, most religions and most religionists do hold to absolutes.

He continues that “religious faith doesn’t have to involve denialism,” defined as rejection of the existing scientific evidence due to religious faith, as with those he labels “fundamentalists.” A typical example would be the “young Earth” creationists, whose literal interpretation of the Bible rejects science’s long-held conclusion that our universe and home planet have existed for billions upon billions of years.


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Podcast: Norman Lear's America was liberal, but not totally secular (correction)

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Podcast: Norman Lear's America was liberal, but not totally secular (correction)

In 2021, the Fellowship For Performing Arts in New York City — which produces “theatre and film from a Christian worldview” — released an ambitious movie with a title that made no attempt to hide its religious content.

To no one’s surprise, “The Most Reluctant Convert: The Untold Story of C.S. Lewis” was popular with the vast audience that reads and supports the work of the Oxford don who was one of the 20th Century’s most influential Christian apologists.

However, FTA founder Max McLean — who played the older Lewis in the film — also received support from a source that many would consider surprising. Here’s a key quote:

“God knows we need more intriguing, faith-oriented films like this. Noble is the right word; I would also add courageous and powerful. Thank you for all you do and bravo! You are a true artist.”

The email came from Hollywood legend Norman Lear and his wife, Lyn.

Lear’s death at age 101 has received waves of mainstream news coverage, all of it deserved. The question, explored in this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (CLICK HERE to tune that in), was whether this coverage explored Lear’s complex relationship with the role that religion plays in American life and culture.

Lear considered himself a cultural Jew with no ties to the practice of a traditional religious faith. In response to the rise of the Religious Right, he also founded People for the American Way — a liberal think tank and advocacy group on church-state issues.

However, in the final decades of his long life and career, Lear wrestled with the powerful role that religion played in mainstream American life and was intrigued with the fact that faith issues and stories seemed to be anathema to the powers that be in mass media.

In other words, Lear was an unbeliever who was both appalled and intrigued with people of faith and he wrestled with why liberal forms of faith seemed to have little appeal with ordinary Americans. These tensions could be seen in one of his final, failed attempt at a new sit-com, the six episodes of “Sunday Dinner.” Hold that thought.

This matters, in large part, because the legend of Norman Lear is based on the valid praise he received for dragging real-life issues into American entertainment, especially with his trailblazing TV comedies.


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Americans who never attend worship services are a bit of a political puzzle these days

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Americans who never attend worship services are a bit of a political puzzle these days

I was thinking a bit today about the idea of subgroup composition in the world of politics and religion.

For example, evangelicals could be the same share of the population today as they were in the early 1980s, but that doesn’t mean that the composition of the group hasn’t changed significantly during the previous four decades. In fact, it would be pretty shocking if the racial composition of evangelicals hadn’t shifted and the average educational attainment hadn’t climbed, given the overall macro-level movement in American society.

That got me thinking quite a bit about a specific group — those who never attend religious services.

In 2008, according to the Cooperative Election Study, about 20% of all respondents reported that they never attended religious services. By 2022, that share had risen to 34%. A fourteen point jump is a whole lot of folks, by the way. In fact, in real numbers that’s over 45 million Americans.

But the composition of never attenders has also changed as that group has grown so much larger. What I really wanted to do is help readers better conceptualize this group — especially when it comes to politics.

One of my hobby horses recently has been trying to convince people that they need to stop thinking about Republicans as incredibly religiously active and Democrats are the ones who have nothing to do with religion. The Republican coalition is looking less and less religious every year and this is going to have big impacts in the elections to come.

Let’s start broad — with the share of each party identification that never attended religious services between 2008 and 2022.

In 2008, Independents were the most likely to be never attenders — bet you wouldn’t have guessed that.

Twenty-eight percent of them checked the “never” box, which was four points higher than Democrats. There were very few Republicans who were never attenders back when Barack Obama faced off against John McCain for the White House — just 10%.


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Church of England backs same-sex blessings and the elite press yawns, once again

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Church of England backs same-sex blessings and the elite press yawns, once again

What we have here is a battle between two relevant parables linked to a major religion-beat story.

The first is that classic ducks analogy. You know the one (care of UsingEnglish.com): " If it walks like a duck, looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it's a duck"

In other words, if the Church of England narrowly approves the use of stand-alone (that’s crucial) rites to bless same-sex relationships, then that is the visual equivalent of same-sex marriage rites. Cue the “duck.”

It’s safe to say that a formal, honest change in Church of England doctrine on marriage would be the last straw for the stressed-out Anglican Communion causing a schism that would probably end up in the lap of King Charles III. At this point, Global South leaders — representing about 75% of Anglicans in pews — have already proclaimed that it's time to start cutting the ties between the "Canterbury Communion" and the rest of the Anglican Communion.

Does it matter that the technically evangelical Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby abstained from the vote? Click here for a conservative Anglican news-you-can-use collection of his actions on this issue in the past.

So the walking duck image is certainly relevant, in this case. However, this brings us to an image that I have used several times here at GetReligion — with Anglican news events, even. I am referring to the “lighthouse” parable and, dang it, it’s relevant once again

As the story goes, this lighthouse had a gun that sounded a warning every hour. The keeper tended the beacon and kept enough shells in the gun so it could keep firing. After decades, he could sleep right through the now-routine blasts. Then the inevitable happened. He forgot to load extra shells and, in the dead of night, the gun did not fire.

This rare silence awoke the keeper, who leapt from bed shouting, "What was that sound?"

Now, once upon a time, almost anything that Anglicans and/or Episcopalians approved on LGBTQ+ issues was automatically one of the year’s most important mainstream news reports. Ditto for actions by Pope Francis or Catholic leaders in once-important lands (think Germany).

Now, this no longer seems to be the case.


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