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I realize that this is strange, but I continue to read press reports (wink, wink) containing evidence that Mitt Romney is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and that this could cause him trouble with evangelical Protestant Christians. Am I alone in reading about this?
Earlier this week, the Associated Press had a nice long story on a Taliban fighter’s religious liberty. “American Taliban fighter Lindh: Prison ban on daily group prayer violates religious freedom” begins by telling us that a federal prison rule barring John Walker Lindh from group prayer is “absurd” and is “causing him to sin against his religion by prohibiting such gatherings in the name of security.”
Whenever you read one of those reflective essays on how The New York Times serves as a cheerleader for progressive causes — thank you, M.Z. — what you really need next is a kind of chaser to clear the journalistic palette.
With GetReligion’s move to the Patheos universe, it’s highly likely that this here weblog has lots of new readers. As a result, some of the language that we use over and over may sound a bit strange, for people who have not been around for our whole eight-year journey.
What we have here, in this short New York Times wedding announcement, is a dangerously vague and terribly loaded word — “assisting” — being used in a liturgical context of some kind. It’s crucial that the word “assisting” is being used in a way that directly connects it with another controversial word in this day and age — “married.”
As you would imagine, I have received a few notes seeking my take, as a journalist and as an Orthodox Christian, on the events involving that crudely named feminist band in Russia. You know, the one that drew this headline the other day in The New York Times: “Anti-Putin Stunt Earns Punk Band Two Years in Jail.”
You know that you have moved into true Bible Belt territory when the locals start asking you — literally while the moving van is in your drive way — blunt questions that sound something like this: “Hey, do you folks know where you’re gonna go church yet?”
There is a serious wildfire raging near one of the monasteries on Mount Athos, which is, without challenge, the most important center of Eastern Orthodox spirituality in the world. Few would dispute that this rocky peninsula in Greece is one of the world’s most important religious centers — period.
