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Daily life may collide with law: Why do so many religions care what believers wear?

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Daily life may collide with law: Why do so many religions care what believers wear?

“ERASMUS” ASKS:

Why do the religious authorities feel strongly about what we wear when we go about our daily lives, when we worship -- or indeed when we swim?

THE RELIGION GUY ANSWERS:

One evening The Religion Guy was at the house of a physician who got an emergency summons to visit a hospital patient. Before departing, he took time to change from a polo shirt, ragged jeans, and sneakers into a dark suit, freshly starched white shirt, tie, and shiny shoes. I asked why bother. He explained that no matter what he wears he’s fully focused on a medical problem, but a vulnerable patient cannot know this and needs visual reassurance.

Point is, clothing and related visuals are ingrained in human interactions, even in the highly individualistic United States. Judges always preside in robes, morticians wear somber suits, uniforms identify security personnel, prisoners or gang memers announce solidarity with tattoos, and teens’ fashions obey social expectations.

So it’s no surprise if many religions ask believers to signify their identity, heritage, devotion, or desired virtues in the same way. That’s the basic answer to the “why” question, but let’s scan some examples.

Religious traditions can provoke public disputes. At this writing Nebraska is discussing whether to cancel a law forbidding religious garb in public schools, which barred hiring of a Catholic nun. This obscure law from 1919 was part of the Ku Klux Klan’s anti-Catholic campaign. The AP reports 36 U.S. states had such laws at one time but now Pennsylvania is the only other state with one. In France, school disputes evolved into a nationwide ban on conspicuous religious garb, aimed especially at Muslim women’s headscarves, followed by a ban on their full face coverings as a security measure.

Faith groups typically define attire and regalia for official functions, whether prescribed robes for Eastern gurus or mitres for popes. Protestant preachers may wear suits or the female equivalent when leading worship (while megachurch preachers favor Technicolor shirts to signal user-friendly informality). We can leave aside clergy complexities since “we” in the question refers to ordinary lay folk.


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Spiritual but not religious? Leading Buddhist magazine takes a hard look at what that means

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The other day here at GetReligion my colleague Bobby Ross Jr. parsed whether atheism canbe considered a "religious" movement. I'd say sometimes yes and sometimes no. But that's neither here or there. Maybe.

Am I clear?

Probably not. So let's try this.

Dictionary definitions sometimes fall short because living languages evolve constantly. That leaves the meaning of some words negotiable -- particularly when trying to convey elastic concepts.

Religion is one such concept. Of course, these days, so is journalism. And so is the term "spiritual but not religious," henceforth SBNR.

It's a handy shorthand we assume is equally understood by all because we -- meaning those of us in the religion journalism trade -- use the term so often. But is it? (Cue the sinister organ music!)

For example: American and other Western journalists who generally grew up in one of the Abrahamic traditions tend to lump their fellow westerners attracted to Buddhist concepts and practices among the SBNR if they don't also declare themselves practicing whatevers. (Did I just coin a new term, the "Whatevers"?)

But it seems many of those Western Christian, Jewish and (to a lesser extant) Muslim non-ethnic Buddhist fellow travelers -- the Whatevers -- have their own questions about the term SBNR.

So much so, it appears, that Tricycle, arguably the best chronicler of the Western Buddhist experience around, felt compelled to take a shot at explaining it. And in a big way.


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Yes, angry rural Democrats are talking: But did the Washington Post team listen to the details?

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So, journalism elites, how is that "listening" to average Americans thing going?

The other day, our own Mark "KMark" Kellner took at look at an admirable effort by the features team at The Washington Post to visit rural, Middle America with the sole (or even soul) intent of listening to what ordinary people had to say in Corbin, Ky.

The story was packed with human details -- including a prayer said (gasp) out loud in a public restaurant. In the end, however, the emphasis was on politics, politics, politics. Politics is, after all, the most important factor in the lives of ordinary Americans. Got that?

You can certainly see that equation at work once again in a new report -- "Rural Americans felt abandoned by Democrats in 2016, so they abandoned them back. Can the party fix it?" -- from the faith-challenged political desk in this same newsroom. This is the latest of many Post political-desk reports that I have looked at in recent months, noting the religion and culture ghosts hiding between the lines. 

You can see the basic tensions in the story in the overture. Who to quote when parsing out the  direct-quote ink? The actual rural Americans or the Democratic Party operatives who are courting them?

HAYWARD, Wis. -- The local Democrats had hoped for 25 people to show up at the meeting, and they set up a dozen more chairs to be safe. By 12:30, 75 Democrats were crowding the VFW community center, some from as far as 90 miles away. They spent two hours venting to Thomas Perez, a candidate for chairman of the Democratic National Committee, about how the party had blown it in rural America.
“I talked to neighbors, to working people, and they felt that the Democrats no longer represented working peoples’ interests,” said Steve Smith, a former state legislator from Wisconsin’s rural north woods who had lost his seat to a Republican in 2014. “I was shocked, but they were speaking from their heart. And in the 2016 election, rural America abandoned Democrats, because they felt like Democrats had abandoned them. We’ve got to use acute hearing and figure out how that happened.”
Perez scribbled in his notebook.

Now, two hours is A LOT of venting. Clearly the folks who turned out for this meeting spoke their minds.


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New Washington Post shocker: Christian bookstore chain wants CDs with 'clean' language! Film at 11

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You can imagine that when one of we happy, few Get Religionistas writes a snarky headline, there's more to follow.

Thus, I trust you won't be disappointed as we join the Washington Post on a voyage of discovery. The find? The shocking development here: Folks who run Christian bookstores respond quickly when customers complain about the content of a product they're selling.

(Your correspondent has direct, personal experience in this matter. I'll get to that in a moment.)

Here, now, the "news." Sho Baraka is an African-American hip-hop artist with a highly creative mind, and a love for Jesus. He's been popular in Christian circles after finding faith a few years back, and his latest album, "The Narrative" (promotional video above) hit the shelves at LifeWay Christian Bookstores, a chain owned by the Southern Baptist Conventions. Then, it appears, some folks listened to the songs, which then alarmed those hearers.

Take it away, Washington Post:

Popular hip-hop artist Sho Baraka has taken aim at Southern Baptist retailer LifeWay Christian Stores for dropping his album for including the word “penis,” a move that shows a growing tension between the black artist and his white evangelical fans.
A spokesman for LifeWay confirmed the retailer’s decision, saying in an email that customers complained about the language, but the representative declined to provide further details.
Christian bookstores don’t usually place rap albums by black activist artists front and center on their shelves. But in recent years, white evangelicals have embraced several black hip-hop artists such as chart-topping rappers Lecrae and Trip Lee, whose albums are sold on LifeWay’s website. Baraka, who was once part of Lecrae’s Reach Records label, said he upset LifeWay customers by including the anatomical reference in his album.

Here's a stunner, right?


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Do Syrian American Christians welcome all the newer Muslim arrivals? It depends ...

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Finding people who back President Trump’s travel ban is like searching for folks who are left-handed. The people are out there, but they don't advertise their presence. Well, almost. The Washington Post found some Syrian families who believe the travel ban is a good idea.

I am not surprised. Back in the 1990s, when I was assisting a newly arrived Kurdish family in northern Virginia, I learned they were against a lot of Iraqi Arabs being allowed to come as well. Kurds and Sunni Arabs haven’t always gotten along in Iraq and, my Kurdish friends assured me, they knew that many Sunnis were up to no good.

They also felt that Americans were pretty naive about Iraqi culture. So, here is what the Post found:

ALLENTOWN, Pa.-- Hookah smoke drifted through the restaurant as Elias Shetayh and Aziz Wehbey spoke intently about their support for President Trump, whose temporary halt on immigration from war-torn Syria — their homeland — had touched off a political firestorm. Nearby, a waitress carried out several platters of Mediterranean food to a large Arab American family.
“Trump is right, in a way, to do what he’s doing,” Shetayh said, discussing the executive order banning certain immigrants from entry into the United States. “This country is going into a disaster.”


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Potential impact of Johnson Amendment repeal: Associated Press delves a little more deeply

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Last year, I wrote about the Johnson Amendment -- the 1954 law that President Donald Trump has vowed to "totally destroy" -- in a piece for Christianity Today's ChurchLawandTax.com project.

My article was titled "Avoiding the elephant (or donkey) in the pulpit." 

In that story, some pastors noted a difference -- in their view -- between (1) touching on biblical issues that some might label political and (2) taking overtly partisan stands.

This is a long chunk of material, but I think readers will find it useful in looking at some new reporting by the Associated Press. OK, here we go:

Dean Inserra doesn’t back down from preaching on political issues. Neither does Inserra, founding pastor of City Church in Tallahassee, Florida, believe in partisanship from the pulpit. How exactly does the 35-year-old pastor manage to address politics without becoming partisan?
“I’m unashamed and quick to speak on issues,” the Southern Baptist pastor said, suggesting that cultural concerns such as racial reconciliation, immigration, sexuality, and poverty “are spiritual issues before they’re political issues.”
“If we stay in the Word, two things are going to happen,” Inserra said. “One, we won’t be able to avoid speaking on political issues because they’re listed throughout Scripture. Two, we’re not going to be accused of being partisan or political because even our biggest critic will have to conclude. . . that we’re just teaching what the Bible says.”
Inserra serves a politically diverse congregation of about 1,000 people in Florida’s capital city. His audience each Sunday is a mix of college students, young professionals, and state government employees -- both Democrats and Republicans.
To avoid partisanship, Inserra said he focuses on the Bible -- and tries to be consistent in how he applies the Scriptures, whether talking about abortion or Syrian refugees.
“To me, immigration and abortion can come out of the same breath because they’re both life issues,” said Inserra, who started City Church when he was 26. “Maybe two of the most vulnerable people in our society are, one, the unborn child, and two, the refugee.
“If we’re always finding ourselves perfectly siding with one party as a Christian,” he added, “we’re probably more in that party than we are Christian when it comes to our views.”’

Wait. There's more. In that piece, I explained:


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Looking for on-the-record Vatican voices in the New York Times shocker about Darth Bannon

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It would be hard to imagine a subject more intriguing to some editors at The New York Times than suggestions that the Darth Vader of the Donald Trump administration -- that would be Stephen K. Bannon -- was somehow working with forces close to the Vatican to undercut Pope Francis.

Thus, there has been quite a bit of online buzz about the rather BuzzFeed like feature (in terms of its sourcing) that Times editors ran under the headline, "Steve Bannon Carries Battles to Another Influential Hub: The Vatican." 

Catholic insiders -- on the left and right -- will be able to see more in the thin tea leaves of this piece than I can. I am primarily interested in journalism issues linked to how the piece was reported and presented. The bottom line: It is very rare to see such sweeping, conspiratorial language used in a news feature that -- on its key points of fact -- appears to have one crucial named source, other than quotes from other journalists. Hold that thought.

The intrigue, as you would expect, starts right where it should -- in the overture.

ROME -- When Stephen K. Bannon was still heading Breitbart News, he went to the Vatican to cover the canonization of John Paul II and make some friends. High on his list of people to meet was an archconservative American cardinal, Raymond Burke, who had openly clashed with Pope Francis.
In one of the cardinal’s antechambers, amid religious statues and book-lined walls, Cardinal Burke and Mr. Bannon -- who is now President Trump’s anti-establishment eminence -- bonded over their shared worldview. They saw Islam as threatening to overrun a prostrate West weakened by the erosion of traditional Christian values, and viewed themselves as unjustly ostracized by out-of-touch political elites.
“When you recognize someone who has sacrificed in order to remain true to his principles and who is fighting the same kind of battles in the cultural arena, in a different section of the battlefield, I’m not surprised there is a meeting of hearts,” said Benjamin Harnwell, a confidant of Cardinal Burke who arranged the 2014 meeting.

Harnwell appears to be the main source for this entire story. He is founder of the Dignitatis Humanae Institute, a foundation that -- as the Times piece notes -- is currently displaying prominent images of Bannon, linked to quotations praising Harnwell.

The timing of the meeting is fascinating and, for journalists, a bit problematic.


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Why did the Wichita Eagle go into full-force 'activist mode' in reporting on California travel ban?

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The phrase "travel ban," included in the headline above, will evoke all sorts of thoughts in America's current political state of mind.

Feel free to dismiss them. 

This post is about an actual news story concerning a real, live, travel ban. And Donald J. Trump's red-hot executive-order pen has nothing to do with it.

California, the one-time republic now part of the United States, has implemented a September 2016 law prohibiting the state and its agencies from spending money in places where alleged "discrimination" against gays is practiced, the Wichita Eagle, published in the state's largest city, reports:

California has banned state-funded travel to Kansas after determining that the Sunflower State is one of four in the nation with laws that it views as discriminatory toward gay people.
The policy could prevent public universities in California from scheduling sporting events with Kansas teams and raises the question of whether teams will travel to Wichita in 2018, when the city is scheduled to host two rounds of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament.
“California must take action to avoid supporting or financing discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people,” states the California law, which was passed in September. The law prohibits state agencies and universities from using state dollars to pay for travel to states with laws it views as discriminating against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. There are a few exceptions, such as for law enforcement purposes.
Kansas is on the travel prohibition list because of a 2016 law that enabled college campus religious groups to require that members adhere to their religious beliefs and standards. That law was crafted partially in response to a controversy in California that occurred when a Christian student group lost recognition on California State University campuses for failure to comply with an “all comers” non-discrimination policy in 2014.

Unlike those controversial bills in North Carolina on transgendered people and bathrooms, or the since-amended Indiana Religious Freedom Restoration Act, the Kansas law makes no specific mention of sexuality but merely allows campus-based religious groups to require that leaders and members adhere to the group's beliefs.


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Anti-Islamophobia: A nuanced portrayal of Syrian refugees in the heart of red-state America

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Stereotypes plague so much news coverage of Muslims in Donald Trump's America.

I'm talking about negative pieces that attempt to turn every conservative state into a bastion of hatred toward Islam and its followers.

These are the type of stories that take a single case — or a few random incidents — and scream, "Islamophobia!" See examples here, here, here, here and here. Too often, these articles rely on squishy generalizations when what readers really need — and deserve — are hard facts.

So what's the antidote to such poor journalism?

Well, reporting that focuses on real people — with real context and real nuance — would be a nice place to start.

Speaking of which, the Washington Post (for which I occasionally freelance) featured just such a story on its front page Monday.

Post national writer Robert Samuels both enlightens and surprises — both nice traits for a newspaper story — as he paints a portrait of Syrian refugees in a state where nearly three out of five voters supported Trump:

OMAHA — The rice and chicken were steaming on the stove. The twins chased each other around the apartment and the 2-year-old watched Mickey Mouse on the donated television.
Their mother, Fatema Aljasem, 29, sat at the kitchen table with two women from the local synagogue. Since the Syrian was granted asylum in September, the women had been helping her learn English. She pulled at her hijab and pointed at the words, mouthing ways of conjugating the verb “to go.”
“Shadi goes to school. Ahmad goes to work.”


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