After 18 years, the military’s Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell policy officially ended at midnight, and, as you can see from this AP video, gays and lesbians in San Diego had quite the party.
Not partying: The LDS-owned Deseret News, which says there are still “significant concerns” about chaplains’ rights to oppose homosexuality on religious grounds.
Americans who believe their life has a divinely appointed destiny are more likely to oppose government economic policies and unemployment benefits for healthy people, according to a new Baylor University study.
Another interesting number from the study: 27 percent of Americans do not believe God has a plan for their lives.
As President Obama seeks to douse a diplomatic crisis over the approval of a Palestinian state at the UN this week, New York magazine asks if Obama is the “first Jewish president.”
The Forward reports that Obama’s campaign will launch its Jewish outreach today. A Gallup poll says Obama has not seen a disproportionate drop of support from Jewish Americans.
GOP candidate Rick Perry is also in the Big Apple, where he’s expected to give a pro-Israel speech today. Will he sound the Christian Zionist trumpet? We shall see.
There is growing evidence that countries with wide income disparities tend to be more religious. In fact the former may explain the latter, CT reports.
Israel says Egypt has banned the export of palm fronds used during Succoth celebrations to Israel and other Jewish communities.
Pope Benedict XVI will find a welter of emotions when he visits Germany, from pride to indifference to antagonism. In other words, he’s going home.
The Archbishop of Canterbury says atheism is “the new cool thing.” A “brain expert” says Pat Roberston may be mentally ill.
More Americans are asking friends, rather than clerics, to preside over their weddings. Good news for the Universal Life Church, but bad tidings for traditional religious communities, WaPo reports.
The man accused of killing his wife and then shooting two church pastors had pleaded guilty and been sentenced to 10 years of probation in 1987 in the slaying of a previous wife, the AP reports. Investigators found the suspect’s home Bible opened to the Sermon on the Mount, of all things.
A Georgia man on death row faces execution by lethal injection today, despite the intervention of Pope Benedict and other religious leaders.
Failing churches are finding new life as megachurch satellites.
The Foo Fighters played Westboro Baptist Church an impromptu show in Kansas City, serenading the anti-gay activists with a song called “Hot Buns.”
The catchy ditty includes the lyrics: “Driving all night, got a hankering for something/Think I’m in the mood for some hot-man muffins.”
I do not urge you to Google the phrase “man muffins.”
Churches in Los Angeles are partnering with health officials to combat rising rates of STDs.
Yr hmbl aggregator,
Daniel Burke
