As the Supreme Court hears arguments on the health care law this week, religious groups will be among those watching closely. Leading some of the response to the Health and Human Services ruling employers providing contraception, Timothy Dolan is likely to be among those particularly interested in the outcome. Last week, we looked at Newsweek‘s profile of the archbishop of New York, one that I thought did a nice job . After some less than ideal coverage of Dolan, it’s nice to see someone take a more thorough look from more sides, including historical and political. Read it again.
NYTs tiptoes toward logic on "Catholic vote"
If you are going to read the latest New York Times piece on candidate Rick Santorum and the “Catholic vote,” your first task is to keep reading — past the headline, the one that simply says: “Santorum Fails to Capture Catholic Vote.”
Here's your religious freedom rally round-up
Two faces of pope's Cuba visit
Ghosts in those "Hoodie Sunday" stories?
It didn’t take me very long, after I arrived in Charlotte, N.C., to get a bit frustrated with the leaders of that city’s powerful African-American churches.
A blip on Benedict's enthusiasm meter
In the lead-up to Pope Benedict XVI’s trip to Mexico, news reports were oddly obsessed with a sort of popularity contest between the current and preceding pope. We kept joking about the secret “enthusiasm meters” reporters must be consulting to come up with stories such as this one from December:
Shedding light on Christianity in the Dark Ages
The Guardian has a really interesting story (“Cross and bed found in Anglo-Saxon grave shed new light on ‘dark ages’“) about how Cambridge archaeologists are thrilled by their recent discovery of a 7th century grave with body of young woman on a bed with an ornate gold cross:
From Russia with love
An article from the Moscow correspondent of the New York Times has left me perplexed. On one level the story entitled “Punk riffs take on God and Putin” is a silly piece of journalism.
Santorum and the mythical "women's vote"
Anyone who has followed American politics since, oh, roughly 1973, knows that one of most consistent patterns, election after election, is this: The more people attend worship services, the more likely they are to vote for candidates who are moral and cultural conservatives. This is a clear pattern among white voters and if you are looking for conservative voters among African-American and Latino voters, you are most likely to find them — as a vocal minority — in their churches.
