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Overall, giving to religious causes amounted to close to a third of all charitable giving in 2016, Giving USA says. Religious institutions received $122.94 billion that year, or 32 percent of charitable donations. That figure is more than double the amount received by educational institutions, the next highest sector within nonprofits, which garnered $59.77 billion.
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The right of Jehovah’s Witnesses to adhere to their faith’s rejection of military service — they believe their allegiance is to God alone — is recognized in the U.S. and other Western countries. But Tajikistan has no law concerning conscientious objectors.
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Of 1,131 active-duty service members, 30 percent surveyed that white nationalism poses a greater threat to U.S. national security than ISIS conflicts in Syria and Iraq, as additionally reported by Newsweek.
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A judge on Wednesday refused to block President Donald Trump's decision to end subsidy payments to health insurers under Obamacare, handing Trump a victory against Democratic attorneys general who have regularly challenged the president's policies in court.
Image via Conservative Concerned About the Death Penalty study named "The Right Way: More Republican lawmakers championing death penalty repeal."
“This is a system that is broken; we shouldn’t trust this system when we’re got the evidence to show that it doesn’t work,” said former Nebraska state Sen. Colby Coash. Nebraska was the first red state to abolish the death penalty.
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The administration also will place on hold a program that allows for family reunification for some refugees resettled in the United States, according to a Trump administration memo seen by Reuters and sent to Congress on Tuesday. The resettling of so-called following-to-join refugees will resume, according to the memo, once screening "enhancements have been implemented."
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Just how religion plays into our biological impulse for empathy is not yet clear. One study from the University of Chicago shows that religious upbringing is associated with less altruism. Other studies have shown the contrary; a University of Warsaw study found that religious beliefs are positively associated with empathy, as empathic skills are crucial factors for religion.
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Amid revelations that extremist groups have exploited social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter to influence voters and steer readers toward fake-news, the nation’s premier anti-Semitism watchdog is training its eye on the tech world to combat hate speech online.
The Anti-Defamation League will hold a summit in San Francisco on Nov. 13 featuring Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn, along with executives from Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit to discuss ways of fighting the growing menace of cyber hate.
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It’s easy to associate the worst crimes of the Nazi regime with the leading villains — Adolf Hitler, Hermann Göring, Heinrich Himmler, Joseph Goebbels. But it took countless faceless bureaucrats, sitting in offices, pushing paper, and drafting plans, to enable the Nazi state. The manufacturer J.A. Topf built the crematoria, and coal miners and steel makers produced raw materials for the machinery of the concentration camps.
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“A lot of times churches are trying to preserve the legacy of who founded the congregations founded long ago,” said Elizabeth Eaton, the presiding bishop of the ELCA. “When you try to hold on to something so tightly, you strangle it. Taking a risk while being faithful to the core message of grace is my advice.”
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The three white nationalists, Tyler Tenbrink, William Fears, and Colton Fears, were charged with attempted homicide by Gainesville police.
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Global pollution accounts for approximately 9 million premature deaths every year, according to a report by The Lancet Commission on Pollution and Health.
The comprehensive study found that pollution is linked to 1-in-6 deaths globally — accounting for three times more than AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis combined, The Guardian reports.
2. On the Political Uses of Evil
The trouble with contemporary political uses of evil isn’t the concept itself, but rather the intentional vagueness thrust upon it by an era without any well-defined theory of the good.”
Campaigning outside a Berlin church for elections on July 23, 1933. The banner says “Vote for List 1, German Christians.” Image via RNS/Wikimedia Commons.
Most visitors to events in Germany marking this year’s 500th anniversary of the Reformation, however, probably didn’t expect to find an exhibition setting out just how extensively the Nazis used Luther to justify their anti-Semitism and nationalism.
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“The administration is going to challenge it [the court’s halt] and continue to try to make sure it [the ban] happens, ” said Isra Chaker, one of the speakers at the rally and a campaigns advisor at Oxfam America focusing on refugees.
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In the aftermath of a Oct. 14 truck bombing that killed over 300 people in Mogadishu, Somalia, thousands of people took to the capital's streets in response to mayor Thabit Abdi's call to unity, according to The Guardian.
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More than 60 years ago, the divinity school denied him admission because he is black. Speaking at a service in Goodson Chapel, he asked: “What is it that God would have Duke Divinity School do in light of that history? For if one is not honest about that history, one can’t be fully present.”
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"On one side, it's a bold declarative statement that 'I'm not ashamed' and 'I'm not alone.' On the other side, it's a statement from survivor to survivor that says 'I see you, I hear you, I understand you and I'm here for you or I get it," says Tarana Burke.
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“The Muslims see us as Jews and the Jews see us as fanatics. They’re wary of us. It’s difficult."
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23 protesters were arrested at a demonstration against the Atlantic Sunrise gas pipeline in Lancaster County, Pa., on Oct. 16, according to the York Daily Record.