Mastodon

Wednesday's Religion News Roundup: Russell Crowe as Noah; turbulence on El Al; guns in churches

Wednesday’s Religion News Roundup: Russell Crowe as Noah; turbulence on El Al; guns in churches

Jurors in Vermont convicted a Mennonite pastor of aiding and abetting a woman who fled to Nicaragua to avoid sharing custody of her daughter with her lesbian ex-partner.

Down in Louisville, they're showing how to retrofit a 134-year-old gothic Catholic church into a hipster megachurch.

A Florida woman is suing El Al Airlines after an ultra-Orthodox man took her seat on a flight to Israel so that he didn't have to sit next to a woman in his original assigned seat. The poor lady also lost out on the veggie meal she had ordered.


Billy Graham is back home after a brief stint in the hospital for bronchitis. Gospel singer BeBe Winans isn't in a rush to see “Sparkle,” the new Hollywood flick starring his longtime friend, Whitney Houston.

Catholics are nearly twice as likely as evangelicals to support stricter gun control laws, according to a poll out this morning from PRRI and RNS.

Remember those bizarre Amish beard-cutting attacks? The splinter sect at the center of it all asked a judge to bar the words “cult” “splinter” and “rogue” from an upcoming trial. Oops, guilty as charged.

We've got our first peek at Russell Crowe as Noah, scheduled to hit theaters in 2014 (that's him, top left).

This week on the Religion News Godcast: Azariah Southworth, the guy who outed evangelical writer Jonathan Merritt.

New research says today's would-be clergy are “too poor to take the vow of poverty” because of excessive student loan debt.


Nellie Gray, the matriarch of the annual March for Life against abortion each year in Washington, has died at 88.

Religious extremists want to strip a Tunisian athlete of her Olympic medal because her running gear was too revealing, and say a swimmer doesn't deserve his medals because he drank juice during the day during Ramadan.

The most popular name for baby boys in jolly ol' England? Mohammed (again).

Across the Channel in France, two-thirds of the French are willing to say oui to gay marriage.

— Kevin Eckstrom

It'll cost you an absurd amount to see Russell Crowe as Noah at the movies, but getting the Religion News Roundup via email will cost you absolutely nothing. Here's how to sign up:

 

No paywalls here. Thanks to you.
As an independent nonprofit, RNS believes everyone should have access to coverage of religion that is fair, thoughtful and inclusive. That's why you will never hit a paywall on our site; you can read all the stories and columns you want, free of charge (and we hope you read a lot of them!)

But, of course, producing this journalism carries a high cost, to support the reporters, editors, columnists, and the behind-the-scenes staff that keep this site up and running. That's why we ask that if you can, you consider becoming one of our donors. Any amount helps, and because we're a nonprofit, all of it goes to support our mission: To produce thoughtful, factual coverage of religion that helps you better understand the world. Thank you for reading and supporting RNS.
Deborah Caldwell, CEO and Publisher
Donate today