March 24, 2011 | 11:33 am

Weird news of the week: Christian pole dancing

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Follow me on

I remember a similar story a few years ago about Mormon housewives pole dancing toward good health. No honor code violation.

March 23, 2011 | 2:08 pm

Bomb kills at least one, injures 30 in Jerusalem

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

It seems like it’s been a relatively long while since a bombing rocked Jerusalem. No longer:

One woman was killed and at least three dozen people were injured when a bomb exploded in central Jerusalem.

Two of the injuries in the attack, which took place shortly before 3 p.m. Wednesday, were considered serious, according to news reports citing Magen David Adom, Israel’s version of the Red Cross. One of the injured went straight to surgery at Hadassah Hospital; five others are reported in moderate condition, injured by shrapnel packed into the 2- to 4-pound bomb. ...

President Obama in condemning the Jerusalem bombing stressed that “Israel, like all other nations, has a right to self-defense” and “in the strongest possible terms.” In the same statement, Obama offered condolences for the deaths Tuesday of Palestinian civilians in Gaza that were caused by Israeli tank fire.

“There is never any possible justification for terrorism,” Obama said. “We stress the importance of calm and urge all parties to do everything in their power to prevent further violence and civilian casualties.”

Similarly, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in a statement issued from Russia, where he is on an official visit, condemned the attack as well as the Israeli military’s attacks in Gaza that killed eight Palestinians, including the three civilians.

No one has taken credit, but a spokesman for Islamic Jihad praised the bombing.

Let’s hope this isn’t the start of something new. It’s bad enough that for years rockets have been fired from Gaza into southern Israel. A surge of these attacks this week led to Israel responding with airstrikes.

6 Comments — Leave your comment

March 22, 2011 | 3:24 pm

Vatican to U.N.: critics of homosexuality under attack

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Roman Catholic Archbishop Silvano Tomasi told the U.N. Human Rights Council today that those who criticize homosexuality based on personal religious beliefs are being attacked for their views. Via Reuters’ FaithWorld blog:

“People are being attacked for taking positions that do not support sexual behaviour between people of the same sex,” he told the current session of the Human Rights Council.

“When they express their moral beliefs or beliefs about human nature … they are stigmatised, and worse — they are vilified, and prosecuted.

“These attacks are violations of fundamental human rights and cannot be justified under any circumstances,” Tomasi said.

I wonder if Tomasi really said “prosecuted” and not persecuted. Regardless, those who oppose homosexuality from a religious standpoint do seem to be vilified. Just ask the Mormons.

0 Comments — Leave your comment

March 22, 2011 | 1:08 pm

Seymour Hersh on ‘Kill Team’ photos

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

You’d think U.S. armed forces would have learned, especially at a time when most every phone has a camera in it and explosive images quickly go viral online. Clearly, they haven’t.

The German newspaper Der Spiegel released a few graphic images this week of “rogue U.S. soldiers” who allegedly killed innocent civilians in Afghanistan and then posed with the bodies. The Army is now bracing for a backlash.

Seymour Hersh, the legendary investigative reporter who uncovered the My Lai Massacre during the Vietnam War, has already launched a verbal assault. From the New Yorker’s News Desk blog:

Why photograph atrocities? And why pass them around to buddies back home or fellow soldiers in other units? How could the soldiers’ sense of what is unacceptable be so lost? No outsider can have a complete answer to such a question. As someone who has been writing about war crimes since My Lai, though, I have come to have a personal belief: these soldiers had come to accept the killing of civilians—recklessly, as payback, or just at random—as a facet of modern unconventional warfare. In other words, killing itself, whether in a firefight with the Taliban or in sport with innocent bystanders in a strange land with a strange language and strange customs, has become ordinary. ...

The Der Spiegel photographs also help to explain why the American war in Afghanistan can probably never be “won,” in my view, just as we did not win in Vietnam. Terrible things happen in war, and terrible things are happening every day in Afghanistan, as Americans continue to conduct nightly assassination raids and have escalated the number of bombing sorties. There are also reports of suspected Taliban sympathizers we turn over to Afghan police and soldiers being tortured or worse. This will be a long haul; revenge in Afghan society does not have to come immediately. We could end up not knowing who hit us, or why, a decade or two from now.

Read the entire post here.

3 Comments — Leave your comment

March 22, 2011 | 12:51 pm

Giving up sex for Lent

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

In other Lenten news, my GetReligion colleague Sarah Pulliam Bailey has a column in the Indy Star about Christians finding in Lent the motivation to be sexually abstinent for the long haul. She writes:

Sexual abstinence is often viewed as an unattainable ideal, as Bristol Palin said after having her baby, “Everyone should be abstinent or whatever, but it’s not realistic at all.” But Lent can offer a window into the possibility of sustained abstinence.

“Lent can demonstrate that we are capable of going without something for a longer time,” says Father Bob Robeson, a chaplain at Marian University. “Sometimes, even if the person goes back to using Facebook, maybe they won’t be as preoccupied with it.”

I had not seen that line from Bristol Palin, and it’s not as articulate as I’d expect from the daughter of such a great American leader.

Read the rest of Sarah’s column here.

0 Comments — Leave your comment

March 21, 2011 | 11:05 pm

Pastors ‘pasturing’ their flock?

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Last week, as Lent began I noticed more than a few friends saying goodbye to Facebook for the next month. Social media is the new chocolate or booze—it can be addicting and it’s something identifiable that can be given up for Lent.

Social media, however, has for a few years now been helping people engage spiritually. That’s why a San Francisco pastor told NPR that people shouldn’t give up social media for Lent if it helps them grow spiritually.

That makes sense. The transcript of that interview didn’t:

Rev. REYES-CHOW: Yeah, you know, pasturing a church that’s in its 20s and 30s and myself not being of that ilk, I turned 40 about 18 months ago, it’s a different world for me. You know, I didn’t grow up with social media. I didn’t grow up with that kind of technology. I was right at the beginning in the cusps of that. Whereas I think there’s a generation of people now where that’s the air they breathe, it’s the water they drink, it’s the world in which they live.

I think that’s pastoring, not pasturing, though the concept is humorous.

1 Comments — Leave your comment

March 21, 2011 | 4:40 pm

Mormon musical from ‘South Park’ creators ‘surprisingly sweet’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

“The Book of Mormon” opens in three days. It’s from the creators of “South Park,” two writers who have definitely had fun at the expense of the Mormon religion.

The Broadway play has been getting good reviews. It doesn’t pull punches, but it’s also “surprisingly sweets,” writes Peggy Fletcher Stack of the Salt Lake Tribune:

Sure enough, the production is bawdy, sexually explicit and irreverent. Many believers — especially older viewers or those easily offended — would see it as a blasphemous assault on scriptures, much like the pair’s animated TV series. But the satire and tone were not as hostile as many Mormons feared (though this was a preview and parts could change before the March 24 opening).

“I was expecting to be offended,” said Anne Christensen, a 22-year-old LDS New Yorker, “but was pleasantly surprised by how incredibly sweet it was.”

Her mother, Janet Christensen, added: “It’s not G-rated, but they treated us with affection. And they did their homework.”

The play is a story about faith and doubt, with actions and themes that will be familiar to most Utahns, no matter their religious tradition.

I’m looking forward to it.

3 Comments — Leave your comment

March 21, 2011 | 3:07 pm

Helen Thomas talks Jews and Israel to Playboy

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Last summer, Helen Thomas lost her job in the White House press corps after saying Jews should get out of Palestine and go back to whatever God-forsaken European country they came from. Then, last month she said that post-War European Jews had life easy.

Now she tells Playboy that she’s no anti-Semite, just an anti-Zionist who was “fed” up with Israel. Via JTA:

I knew I’d hit the third rail,” she said in an interview published in the April issue of Playboy. “You cannot say anything about Israel in this country. But I’ve lived with this cause for many years. Everybody knows my feelings that the Palestinians have been shortchanged in every way.

“Sure, the Israelis have a right to exist—but where they were born, not to come and take someone else’s home. I’ve had it up to here with the violations against the Palestinians. Why shouldn’t I say it? I knew exactly what I was doing—I was going for broke. I had reached the point of no return. You finally get fed up.”

When pointedly asked by Playboy contributor David Hochman, who is Jewish, whether she dislikes Jews, Thomas responded:

No. I think they’re wonderful people. They had to have the most depth. They were leaders in civil rights. They’ve always had the heart for others but not for Arabs, for some reason. I’m not anti-Jewish; I’m anti-Zionist. I am anti Israel taking what doesn’t belong to it. If you have a home and you’re kicked out of that home, you don’t come and kick someone else out. Anti-Semite? The Israelis are not even Semites! They’re Europeans, and they’ve come from somewhere else. But even if they were Semites, they would still have no right to usurp other people’s land. There are some Israelis with a conscience and a big heart, but unfortunately they are too few.

2 Comments — Leave your comment

March 20, 2011 | 7:05 pm

‘American Pope’ on gay marriage, celibacy and ordination of women

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

I’m having trouble viewing the site, but “60 Minutes Overtime” is showing an interview tonight with Archbishop Timothy Dolan of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York.

The press release says Dolan discusses on his views on gay marriage, celibacy and the ordination of women. For instance:

“I have a strong desire to play shortstop for the Yankees. But I don’t have a right to because I don’t have what it takes. And that’s what the Church would say about marriage.”

1 Comments — Leave your comment

March 19, 2011 | 12:35 pm

Manufactured controversy over Crystal Cathedral’s choir covenant?

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Crystal Cathedral got a lot of negative attention this week for having required choir members to sign a statement saying God intends sex only for married heterosexuals. Here’s what the Los Angeles Times reported:

“Crystal Cathedral ministries believes that it is important to teach and model the biblical view,” reads the paragraph in the Crystal Cathedral Worship Choir and Worship Team Covenant that has raised the ire of some choir members. “I understand that Crystal Cathedral Ministries teaches that sexual intimacy is intended by God to only be within the bonds of marriage, between one man and one woman.”

In a statement Tuesday, Senior Pastor Sheila Schuller Coleman said the covenant is meant to clarify expectations placed on choir members as ministry leaders. But she also offered an apology.

“The church of Jesus Christ at large is grappling with the challenge of reconciling love and adherence to God’s word, even those passages that challenge us,” she said. “As the church has been engaging in this sensitive dialogue, people that we care for deeply have been hurt. We are sincerely sorry.”

I don’t really see what all the fuss is about. This is not like the loyalty oaths that UC professors had to sign in the late ‘40s and ‘50s. Everyone knows that the Orange Church megachurch, which has its roots in the Reform Church in America, believes that God condones neither premarital sex nor homosexual acts.

Still, the Crystal Cathedral’s founder, the Rev. Robert Schuller, who retired a few years back, said he would not have approved of a covenant with the choir members. He did, however, emphasize that the covenant’s statement on homosexuality was in step with the church’s beliefs.

2 Comments — Leave your comment

March 19, 2011 | 10:47 am

Obama announces interfaith challenge for college students

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

College is, as I’ve discussed here before, a time when people are exposed to religions other than the one they grew up with. But what if colleges had a program to encourage interfaith service projects by college students? This week President Obama announced such an initiative. A little about “The President’s Interfaith and Community Service Campus Challenge” from Laurie Goodstein at The New York Times:

He said in a video announcement that the purpose is to encourage cooperation among students of diverse religious beliefs — as well as non-believers. The initiative, which has no discrete government financing, was announced by the White House faith-based office and the Corporation for National and Community Service.

0 Comments — Leave your comment

March 17, 2011 | 6:27 pm

Islamic bond market making a comeback

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Despite unrest in the Mideast, Muslim money is back. The New York Times reports:

It is too soon to say what effect the turmoil in Bahrain and elsewhere may have on the market, analysts said. But by mid-February, more than $16 billion worth had already been issued worldwide since the start of the year. High-profile issues from the Gulf region included a 3.5 billion dirham, or $953 million, sukuk from Aldar Properties in Abu Dhabi, issued on Feb. 28 and maturing in December 2013.

“What the market has done in 2009-2010 is grow back to the 2007 level of issuances,” said Paul-Henri Pruvost, an analyst covering Central Europe, the Middle East and Africa at S.&P. “Malaysia remains the real driver of the sukuk market, but compared to Southeast Asia, there are other large sukuk markets, such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, that have strong economic needs and are still creditworthy.”

After two turbulent years, the market started making a strong comeback at the end of 2010. While Malaysia continues to dominate the sukuk market, accounting for 78 percent, or $39.8 billion, of total issuances in 2010, activity is picking up in the Gulf. The value of Islamic bonds issued in the Gulf alone jumped 61 percent in the past year, with issuances valuing $7 billion in 2009-2010, compared to $4.3 billion the previous year, according to research by the international commercial law firm Trowers & Hamlins.

What’s not clear from this story is what makes Muslim bonds Muslim. My recollection is that Islamic law—Sharia—prohibits the payment or acceptance of interest for loaning money. Islamic bonds and Islamic banking in general get around that, though I don’t really understand how.

1 Comments — Leave your comment