Monthly Archives: June 2009
Dodd embraces SSM
By Mark Silk — June 23, 2009
Sen. Chris Dodd, fighting for his political life here in Connecticut, has announced a change of heart on same-sex marriage: He now supports it. Anti-SSM professional Peter Wolfgang of the Family Institute of Connecticut calls Dodd out for political expediency: “He took a position against same-sex marriage when he was running for president because that […]
Chaplain dies five years after being wounded in Iraq
By Tracy Gordon — June 23, 2009
(RNS) A Minnesota Catholic priest who was seriously wounded five years ago while serving as a chaplain in Iraq died Saturday (June 20), his archdiocese announced. The Rev. Tim Vakoc, a retired Army chaplain who was wounded on May 29, 2004, died at a nursing home in New Hope, Mich. He is believed to be […]
Unitarians say they’re `Standing on the Side of Love’
By Tracy Gordon — June 23, 2009
(RNS) Members of Unitarian Universalist churches are unveiling a campaign against hate crimes at their General Assembly this week (June 24-29), calling on their congregations and those of other faiths to advocate for equality and to curb violence. The Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations (UUA) will include the grassroots campaign against social injustice in their […]
Priest criticized for remarks on wartime pope
By Tracy Gordon — June 23, 2009
ROME (RNS) The Vatican has reprimanded a high ranking Catholic priest for suggesting that the sainthood of controversial wartime Pope Pius XII has been put on ice to avoid harming relations with Judaism. The Rev. Peter Gumpel, the Vatican’s chief official investigating Pius’ sainthood cause, was effectively told to back off after complaining that Pope […]
Can a bad person still make a good Jew?
By Kevin Eckstrom — June 23, 2009
That’s the question asked over at The Forward now that former Liberian dictator (and accused war criminal) Charles Taylor has apparently embraced Judaism — at least that’s what his wife says. From the story: “What if the former dictator – accused of creating an army of child soldiers who went on murderous rampages – actually, […]
NEWS SIDEBAR: Faith healing and the courts
By Tracy Gordon — June 23, 2009
Following is a summary of major case law involving the law and faith healing, both in the U.S. and in Oregon, where Carl and Raylene Worthington will face manslaughter charges in the death of their infant daughter in a trial that starts Tuesday (June 23). Prince v. Massachusetts The U.S. Supreme Court’s 1994 decision set […]
Ore. parents to stand trial in daughter’s faith-healing death
By Tracy Gordon — June 22, 2009
OREGON CITY, Ore. — Ava Worthington died surrounded by loved ones who believed their prayers would heal the young child. As the 15-month-old girl struggled to breathe, church members anointed her with oil and pleaded with God to provide a cure. But Ava died March 2, 2008, of bronchial pneumonia and a blood infection. Antibiotics […]
Running the numbers on ACNA
By Daniel Burke — June 22, 2009
As the new Anglican Church in North America holds its inaugural assembly this week in Bedford, Texas, it’s been getting a lot of media attention. After all, it’s not every day that 100,000 conservative Anglicans try to usurp the centuries-old Episcopal Church and Anglican Church of Canada. But what about those 100,000 members that ACNA […]
To beat the heat, popes head south to summer palace
By Tracy Gordon — June 22, 2009
CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy — A pope’s thoughts are supposed to run toward heaven, but summer temperatures in Rome typically evoke a different destination. So when the heat rises, the leader of the Catholic Church heads for the hills — and the Vatican’s equivalent of Camp David. Unlike the secluded presidential retreat in the Maryland mountains, […]
Let’s get ready to rumble
By Kevin Eckstrom — June 22, 2009
Ann Rodgers out at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has a comprehensive profile of former-Episcopal-now-Anglican Bishop Bob Duncan as he prepares to be annointed the archbishop of the new Anglican Church of North America in Texas this week. This is my favorite quote, from one of Duncan’s critics in Pittsburgh: “The only program he has kept to […]
Notre Dame’s Pastor
By Mark Silk — June 22, 2009
Having discussed the matter in executive session and gotten out of Dodge…er San Antone, the Catholic bishops have now issued a statement on behalf of their comrade, the Ordinary of the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, who criticized and boycotted his local Catholic university when it bestowed an honorary degree on the President of the […]
Faith-Based Future
By Mark Silk — June 22, 2009
Anyone interested in following the fortunes of Son of Faith Based: the Obama Years needs to download “Taking Stock: The Bush Faith-Based Initiative and What Lies Ahead,” a Pew-sponsored report of the Rockefeller Institute of Government’s Roundtable on Religion and Social Welfare Policy released this month. Author David J. Wright gives provides a fine (if […]
Enlightenment Nerds
By Mark Silk — June 22, 2009
According to John Hodgman, the framers of the Constitution “believed that God was a distant, uncaring dungeonmaster.”
God in Search of Highway
By Mark Silk — June 21, 2009
Props to Missouri for deciding to rename the stretch of highway cleaned up for adoption purposes by neo-Nazis after Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, the Jewish theologian who famously marched with Martin Luther King, Jr. Heschel, who had a nice feel for divine irony, would have been amused. The renaming is to take place this summer, […]
Takbir
By Mark Silk — June 21, 2009
The constant shouting of “Alahu Akhbar” (“God is Great”) by the protesters in Iran has got to be exquisitely annoying to the powers-that-be-shaking there. Known as the Takbir, the phrase is uttered at moments of strong emotion throughout the Muslim world. Along with the wearing of the green (the universal color of Islam), it signifies […]
