Religion

Jenna Barnett 12-08-2023

Graphic by Mitchell Atencio, Sojourners

Each book, whether subtly or overtly, shows readers how to build community in the face of both real and existential danger.

The U.S. Supreme Court building in Washington, D.C. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst/File Photo

The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday allowed more public funding of religious entities in an important ruling in favor of two Christian families who challenged a Maine tuition assistance program that excluded private schools that promote religion.

Zaina Qureshi 3-08-2022

Kids in Asheville, N.C., participate in demonstration in Park Square on September 20, 2019. Photo Credit: Judith Bicking/Alamy via Reuters.

Pew Research conducted a study in 2020 examining teens’ relationship to religion compared to their parents: data from that report showed that while 43 percent of parents claimed religion was “very important to them,” only 24 percent of teens answered similarly. In 2021, Springtide Research Institute, where I am a student ambassador, found that 52 percent of young people believe that religious communities are “rigid” and too “restrictive.”

JR. Forasteros 10-20-2021

Photo by Dan Burton on Unsplash

Should Christians have anything to do with horror? Is there anything commendable or worthy of praise in the genre?

As a pastor whose love of horror has only deepened over the years, I offer a resounding yes. Horror is a genre uniquely able to invite us into spaces of confession and lament, if only we have ears to hear.

Gina Ciliberto 8-26-2021

Mutual aid illustration via Shutterstock.

Mutual aid — unlike charity — is based on reciprocity. While everyone who participates doesn’t contribute the same way, each person offers something. Proponents of mutual aid often stress that their involvement is not based on giving from their own excess, but practicing solidarity with their community. Most mutual aid is regionally based, as specific as a neighborhood or broad as large cities.

The members of the U.S. Supreme Court pose for a group photo in Washington, D.C. on April 23, 2021. Erin Schaff/Pool via REUTERS

A Reuters analysis of emergency applications over the past 12 months offers a glimpse into the full range of parties seeking urgent relief from the top U.S. judicial body through the shadow docket. The justices have increasingly relied upon this process to make rulings in a wide array of cases without the normal deliberative process involving public oral arguments and extensive written decisions.

Mitchell Atencio 1-08-2021

Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester addresses constituents following the attack on the U.S. Capitol in a video statement. Image via Facebook screengrab.

On Wednesday, symbols of Christian nationalism were on full display among many of those who stormed the U.S. Capitol. However, both before and after Wednesday's attacks, some legislators invoked the language of faith in a different way: to reject President Donald Trump's repeated attempts to to discredit the election and the insurrection it sparked.

Shaun Casey 6-15-2020

U.S. President Donald Trump holds up a Bible as he stands in front of St. John's Episcopal Church across from the White House after walking there for a photo opportunity during ongoing protests over racial inequality in the wake of the death of George Floyd while in Minneapolis police custody, at the White House in Washington, U.S., June 1, 2020. REUTERS/Tom Brenner

After the smoke cleared from “The Battle of Lafayette Square” and the cringeworthy visit by the first couple to the St. John Paul II National Shrine was over, most Americans missed what was supposed to be the crown jewel of the Trump religion propaganda trifecta: the signing of an executive order on international religious freedom. 

Saadia Faruqi 12-05-2019

Image via Anna Sneed. 

There’s a difference between having a strong faith and being religiously obsessed, and religion can definitely be an addiction — in my view it becomes an addiction when it interferes with the rest of a person’s life, when following it means hurting oneself, or hurting other people. For me, I re-invented myself entirely in the wake of my conversion.

These faithful Christians may not realize that they have inherited the long historical lineage of Christianity that, since the early centuries of the common era, has partaken in a deliberate or unwitting de-Judaizing of Christianity. The distancing from its original Jewish leadership, the replacement of Passover with Easter, the changing of names: Yeshua to Jesus, Miriam to Mary, Saul to Paul, continue to this day, despite Christian scholarship, altruism, and the progressive ideal of honoring a diversity of cultures.

Dhanya Addanki 4-05-2019

Like racism in the U.S., the caste system in India is normalized, permeating every aspect of Indian society. With some exceptions, if you asked a middle-of-the-road white evangelical Christian if racism is prevalent in the U.S., they would likely say no. In a similar vein, if you ask any Hindu upper-caste person if casteism exists, they too would likely say no. But the people directly impacted by the systemic ways in which racism and casteism are baked into society would give you a much different answer. 

Rose S. Aslan 3-19-2019

Image via Alexandros Michailidis/Shutterstock

Muslims believe Friday was chosen by God as a dedicated day of worship. In addition to the prayer itself, which is shorter than the usual midday prayers, Friday services include a sermon, usually given by a professional male Muslim clergy member in Muslim majority countries, but in the West, they are also given by a male lay community member.

Kietryn Zychal 2-28-2019

Image via Kietryn Zychal 

Inside the court, the arguments were more complicated and hinged on previous decisions about the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment which states “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” Justices questioned what constitutes an endorsement of religion? Which precedents from which cases should apply?

the Web Editors 12-28-2018

A look back at Sojourners favorite stories in 2018, Lin-Manuel Miranda, modern parenting, and more on this week's Wrap! 

Samantha Field 9-28-2018

I slowly came to understand that if I was going to remain a Christian, I needed to find a path that had room for the rage and grief I carried with me as a rape survivor. Rage is the only human and rational reaction to the trauma I’d experienced, and I could not smother my humanity in order to remain a Christian. It was around this time that I first read The Autobiography of Malcolm X. This past Tuesday, after we read Martin & Malcolm & America by James Cone, my seminary professor asked “what elements of Malcolm’s theology could contribute to Christian theology?” and my answer was immediate: holding space for rage.

Abby Olcese 8-13-2018

Image via Boom! Studios

These comic book creators, and others like them, are drafting complicated, compelling narratives of Christianity that cut across today's expected divisions. Writers and artists who grew up with Christian backgrounds are finding inspiration in the stories and characters who marked them early on, and re-examining them with questioning minds.

Simran Jeet Singh 8-09-2018

Image via Phil Murphy / Flickr

The racist attacks spiked again after 9/11, particularly because Americans did not know about the Sikh religion and conflated the unique Sikh appearance with popular stereotypes of what terrorists look like.

Joe Kay 8-05-2018

It’s a magical experience watching fireflies rise from the ground at dusk and blink their way high into the trees, performing their light show against the night sky. When I learned the science behind how the bugs make their light — a process called bioluminescence — it didn’t make them any less magical to me. Rather, my new insights made me appreciate them more.

Image via arindambanerjee / Shutterstock.com

Like Torrey, Korean Christians who support reunification see it as a political and religious goal. And although it’s an uphill struggle, they believe with faith anything is possible.

Image via Adelle M. Banks / RNS

“He’s placed on an emphasis on women’s role in the church that is fast being questioned, even in the confines of the present-day convention, as that letter signed by women asking for something to be done attests,” Leonard said. “These were not moderate, liberal women. These were women who came of age in the SBC and who challenged his particular theology of marriage and spouse abuse.”