Religion News for 10/4/2010

Hey I just wanted to let you all know something I found out at today's panel before I put up today's news roundup: Open Mosque Week is coming up soon. I hope I see a lot more of this kind of thing in the future. Nice to see this as a counter to the awful drama of Burn A Quran Day. Can anybody recommend a mosque to visit in DC?

Anyhow, here's some stuff you might have missed:

• A French Lutheran couple has started a blog about their walk from Erfurt, Germany to Rome (following Luther's own trail), in an effort to improve Catholic-Protestant relations. (Here I Walk via Tammeus)
• I wouldn't ordinarily include this but it's fun to imagine the religious implications of a civilization or even forms of life literally alien to our own. A new planet with the potential to sustain life has been discovered. If you think Columbian arrival in the New World is responsible for the growth of a number of religions, just wait. (Discovery)
• Why pray for famed, reviled, and respected atheist Christopher Hitchens to recover from cancer? A bunch of Texan religious leaders offer their thoughts. One pretty touching reflection on Hitchens from Jonathan Tran, Assistant Professor of Theological Ethics, Department of Religion at Baylor University: "Too bad this person isn't a Christian; he'd be a good one."(DMN)
• Yep, religious Americans are lacking in their knowledge about religion, as compared to atheists and agnostics. (Pew)
• In the meantime, people (some of whom wouldn't describe themselves as religious, like the person in this story's lede) are increasingly interested in studying religion. (BuffaloNews)
• CNN's Rick Sanchez is off the air after calling Jon Stewart a bigot, among other comments. (WSJ via GetReligion)

Religion News Roundup 5/25/2010

Hello readers! Here's what you may have missed in recent religion news:

• Pope Benedict XVI acknowledged the need for reform within the Catholic Church, and a great deal of self-examination. The Dallas Morning News put out an interesting series of blurbs by local faith leaders regarding Benedict's reflection.
• A friend of mine (and former colleague) is working to get African-American non-religious "out of the closet."
• It's been a rough week or so for the Saudi "morality police," or Mutaween.
• Get Religion does its usual excellent job predicting the religious and political fallout of a repealed "Don't Ask Don't Tell" policy.
• American Catholic women are just about as likely as any American woman to terminate a pregnancy via abortion. Why? Because they're otherwise just like other Americans. (CNNvia Pew)
• Here's some interesting reading from Sojourners about (the biblical) Ruth...as an illegal immigrant. There are some very good points made about choosing compassion over law.
• In a seeming coincidence of the last two points I posted above, a nun (and others, presumably) have been excommunicated for performing an abortion to save a woman's life. (Politics Daily)

Supreme Silliness

The notable lack of religious diversity on the Supreme court is a pretty old and tired topic. If you didn't already know, there are now, with the retirement of John Paul Stevens, only Catholics and Jews on the court.Stevens was the only Protestant, as this article in the New York Times points out.
But I found one part of this article utterly ridiculous, and haven't been able to get it out of my head. Here goes:

'The practical reality of life in America is that religion plays much less of a role in everyday life than it did 50 or 100 years ago,'' said Geoffrey R. Stone, a law professor at the University of Chicago. Adding a Protestant to the court, he said, would not bring an important element to its discussions.

''These days,'' said Lee Epstein, a law professor at Northwestern and an authority on the court, ''we've moved to other sources of diversity,'' including race, gender and ethnicity.'

With due respect to folks who have far greater expertise than I on the Supreme Court, I think this is silliness. To say that we live in a post-religious society is as unrealistic as to say that President Obama's election solved racism. Not that there aren't people saying that too.

I say this because I can already imagine the round the clock paranoid coverage were a Supreme Court nominee, say, Muslim. Heck, while we're at it, let's speculate on the combination of paranoia, curiosity, and hate that would be generated by a Sikh, Buddhist, Hindu, or other religious minority.

Furthermore I would argue something about this:

"religion, which once mattered deeply, has fallen out of the conversation. And it seems to make people uncomfortable on the rare occasions it is raised."

It seems, simply, to be a contradiction in terms. What makes us most uncomfortable perhaps matters the most deeply.

Religion News Roundup (January 15 2010)

Hello readers,

Here's what's been going on in religion recently:

• The writing of the Bible may have started a lot earlier than scholars previously thought. (Haaretz)
• The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life has recently been full of useful statistics about beliefs and attitudes in the U.S. 16.1% of US adults identify as "unaffiliated." Does this mean a lot of agnostics/atheists, or that a significant number of people are fed up with religious organizations?
• Also worth seeing: How religious is your state? (Pew) and the increasingly common mixture of faiths (Pew).
• The recent battle over gay marriage here in D.C. (my hometown) has been leaving many questioning whether the Catholic Church is too influential, or at least, trying to be. Now, a Washington Post guest columnist is asking the same question over a different topic: the healthcare debate. (WaPo).

Have a great Martin Luther King Day weekend!

Seeking Interfaith Understanding

Quick Housekeeping Note: I'm back and blogging it up again in 2010, so happy new year. With my current work schedule it's just to hard to keep doing the daily religion news summary, but I will make an effort to have at least one news summary a week from now on, as well as more regular in-depth commentary about religion stories I'm finding interesting. Now back to our regularly scheduled programming...

There's a piece online from TIME right now about Malaysia's High Court ruling that the word Allah is not exclusive to Muslims. This allows Christian (and presumably other faiths) to publish the word in their newsletters, and claim that Allah is their god as well, apparently a controversial statement because of the country's religious/ethnic makeup.

Some 60% of Malaysia's 28 million people are Malay Muslim, while the rest are ethnic Chinese, Indians and indigenous tribes, practicing various faiths including Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism and animism. Among Christians, the majority Catholics number about 650,000, or 3% of the population.

I know little about the Malay language but the Catholic Church in Malaysia has apparently been using Allah in its Bibles and otherwise for a long while, and in a court case in 2008 cited pre-Islamic use of the term.

But the point missed here by many parties seems to be that as Abrahamic faiths, there is a common god, regardless of names. As the latter part of the TIME article describes, the fact that the Muslim community is so strongly opposed is one of a series of worrying incidents of intolerance in Malaysia. It seems, to me, a missed opportunity for understanding and dialogue.

Religion News for 10/6/2009

Hello readers! Today in 1979, Pope John Paul II became the first pope to visit the White House. And today in religion news...

• The Supreme Court will allow documents from the cases of sex abuse by Catholic priests to go public. (NPR)
• An Italian scientist has reproduced the Shroud of Turin, which is suspected to be (by some, at least) a medieval forgery. (Reuters)
• A former military lawyer is suing so people won't pray for his harm, among other threats. (USAT)
• Brother Ali is a rapper who draws inspiration from Islam. (NPR)

Religion News for 10/5/2009

Hello Readers! It's a beautiful Monday morning. Here's what's been happening lately in religion news...

• Miguel Humberto Diaz is the new American ambassador to the Vatican, and is himself a theologian. (Reuters)
• Pew says support for abortion rights is declining, and that the debate over it is losing steam. (Pew)
• Six of the Supreme Court's justices are now Roman Catholics. Politics Daily's David Gibson has some interesting thought on the implications of that. (PD)
• Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah has taken a stance against evolution at his kingdom's only co-ed university. (Reuters)

Religion News for 9/25/2009

Hi readers! Today marks the anniversary of the closing of the last of the Magdalene Asylums, in 1996. And today in religion news:

• The new interim Massachusetts senator, Paul G. Kirk, is the grand-nephew of a Boston cardinal. All sorts of interesting tidbits at Articles of Faith. (AOF)
• Women in Christian Media has opened a Chicago chapter. (DMN)
• Benjamin Netanyahu has called Iran's president "the antithesis of moral." (Youtube)

Religion News for 9/24/2009

Hello, readers! Today in 622, the prophet Muhammad completed his hijra from Mecca to Medina. And today in religion news...

• Worldwide, witch hunts persecuting women and children are on the rise, according to the UN. (Reuters)
• Tomorrow's Islam on Capitol Hill [site contains automatic audio] event is already attracting attention, not all of it positive, and not all just from anti-Muslim groups. (PD, Beliefnet)
• Pope Benedict XVI will be making his first official visit to Great Britain. (Times of London)
• Leaders from African-American churches will be endorsing Obama's plan for healthcare reform. (LAT)
• Two openly gay members of Congress have endorsed legislation barring workplace discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. (Baltimore Sun)

Religion News for 9/22/2009

Hi, readers! It might be a bit late, but happy Eid and Rosh Hashanah to those celebrating. Today is the birthday of Pakistani philosopher Manzoor Ahmad. And today in religion news...

• Catholic bishops will discuss Middle East peace. Next year. (AP)
• An interesting account of a non-Muslim fasting for a day during Ramadan is over at Speaking of Faith's blog. (SOFObserved)
• There's still conflict about use of eagle feathers in Native American ceremonies. An LA Times article explores the government's role in protecting eagles versus its repression of Native American religious expression (LAT)
• Vietnamese authorities are persecuting followers of a Buddhist monk, Thich Nhat Hanh, who they say advocates "sabotage." (AP via ABC)
• Mike Huckabee won a straw poll for Republican presidential nomination among "Values Voters" conference attendees. (Pew/RNS)
• A Vatican official, Archbishop Raymond Burke, has said the Church erred in administering funeral rites to the late Senator Kennedy. (PD)
• Physician-assisted suicide is becoming an increasingly hot political topic in Britain. (Reuters)

Religion News for 9/16/2009

Hello readers! Today marks the 1843 death of Ezekiel Hart, the first Jew elected to representative office in the British Empire. And today in religion news...

• David Gibson at Politics Daily does an exceptional job at delineating the statements of official Catholics on the issue of healthcare reform. DC's Archbishop Wuerl has also published a column on the issue. (PD, 2)
• The government of the Philippines and Muslim separatists from the south of that country are working towards peace, and allowing international monitoring. (AP)
• Anti-abortion group Operation Rescue is "completely out of money," according to OR president Troy Newman. One abortion provider previously targeted by them isn't so sure. (KC Star)
• Cuba is now allowing religious services in its prisons. (Reuters FaithWorld)

Religion News for 9/11/2009

Hello readers. Today marks the eighth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. I wish all of you a peaceful day of reflection and contemplation.

• The NYT has a wonderful essay by a Muslim woman explaining 9/11 to her child. (NYT)
• The Boston Globe's religion writer lays out a few ways immigrants are changing the face of religion in America. (Articles of Faith)
• A new group called "What's Your Response?" is fighting human trafficking, which is still under the radar here in the US. (Sojourners, CNS)
• Pope Benedict XVI will be meeting with artists from all over the world in November, in order to re-kindle the relationship between religion and art. (CNS)

Books!

I read quite a lot - you might have noticed from my earlier posts. And lately I've been reading a lot of religion books. Since this is my first daily update I figured I'd keep the content pretty light, and just let you all know what religion-related books I've been reading/intend to read soon.

1. What the Buddha Taught, by Walpola Rahula - Having asked the one close Buddhist friend I have what she thought about this book, she advised me that it was a pretty solid introduction. There are subsets and sects within Buddhism, as there are in any major religion, but this is a wonderful start if you're trying to understand the broad picture.

I have a pretty much scholarly interest in Buddhism but the lightness of being I felt when reading this book was a wonderful thing. There is a lot about Buddhism that makes a solid logical sense. It was this that really encouraged me to learn more about it, particularly since the Buddhists I know are journalists or scientists by trade. Whether you want to identify Buddhism as religious, philosophical, or otherwise, it is ultimately comforting and joyful, and I feel very satisfied knowing more about it.

2. The Screwtape Letters, by C.S. Lewis - I am a huge fan of Lewis, as is probably anybody who grew up going to Catholic school and reading the Chronicles of Narnia. As I got older I grew into his Out of the Silent Planet series. With Screwtape, feel like I'm finally reading a Lewis book meant solely for adults. I'm about a quarter of the way through, and the premise is entertaining, the concepts of demons and devils keep the book lively, and I am yet again happy to read the indirect meditations of a great Christian scholar. As far as I can tell, the book contains numerous prescriptions against temptation and for greater peace in one's life. There might be no writer so convincing of Christianity's virtues and yet so cognizant of the faults of the churches which represent it.

3. Confessions, by Augustine of Hippo - I have yet to really delve into this book, but simply happy to read what is essentially the inner struggle of a saint. Few Catholic saints are regarded as Augustine's intellectual equal, and perhaps what lies behind that is the description of his redemption. I would welcome any reader's comments to help me through this book: passages I should meditate on, ones that mean much to you. Let me know what I should look for in Augustine's Confessions.

An Introduction and Some Background

Nice to meet you all!

My name is A.C. Valdez. I am a freelance journalist living in the Washington, D.C. area. I have started this blog as a way of keeping track of my thoughts on religion news and religion issues.

To give you some idea where I'm coming from, I was born in L.A. and in the 90s, my family moved to the D.C. suburbs. I was raised Catholic, though I am no longer an observer. My father is a liberal Catholic. My mother (who is now deceased) was raised Catholic as well, gave up worship as an adult and eventually adopted the attitude that God wants very much for people to figure out how to live for themselves. I probably have Jewish ancestry somewhere back there. Though I have no better evidence of it, my father claims many Spanish Jews migrated to the New World due to persecution.

I have worked at PBS and NPR as well as in smaller media companies. And I really fell in love with religion as a "beat" while working at NPR. Religion or faith means so much to many people, and in such different ways. Unlocking that meaning is a fascinating process. And it probably goes back to my fascination as a kid with ancient Greco-Roman and Norse myths. I remember asking my dad one time why we believed what we did as I grew up and he just replied "Well, it's our mythology." So I studied Catholicism throughout high school. And I've loved learning about religion ever since.

Hopefully by reading this blog, and leaving comments, you'll be able to learn something new, and teach me a couple of things, too.

Photo: "Shrine To World Religions" by EtterVor
Used under a CC Attribution License