Friday's Religion News Roundup: Newt's freemarket marriage; Mormons=Christians?; dammed baptisms

And then there were four.

If you missed the fireworks at the GOP presidential debate last night in Charleston, Newt Gingrich ripped the media for prying into his, er, open marriage (the second one). Meanwhile, Gingrich's lesbian sister says its “frustrating as hell” that her brother gets to have three marriages when she can't even have one. 

Jon Stewart says Newt's marriage philosophy is completely in line with his politics: “He's a free-market man… Free of onerous regulation… He's just encouraging competition.”

The NYT's David Brooks has an interesting column exploring Mitt Romney's Mormon family history and their trek west: “Romney himself experienced none of this hardship, of course, but Jews who didn’t live through the Exodus are still shaped by it.”

Our own Daniel Burke asks a simple question: Are Mormons Christian? The answer, it turns out, is quite complicated.

And lest we overlook Rick Santorum — he picked up a coveted endorsement from Focus on the Family founder James Dobson. Christianity Today Editor-in-Chief David Neff, however, warns that the Texas conclave of conservative activists that anointed Santorum was a bad move.

A curious new study says people respond differently (i.e., more conservatively) to questions if they were near a church, which somehow leads to the conclusion that voters might vote more conservatively if the polling place is in a church.  Or at least that's the implication: “Any time decisions are being made — particularly if they're decisions that relate to social issues and national policy — we should pay attention to the context in which those decisions are made,” says Jordan LaBouff, a psychology lecturer at the University of Maine.

A Nevada church camp is going to court after the feds dammed a stream that was used for baptisms. Republicans, meanwhile, may move the date of Nevada's Feb. 4 primary away from a Saturday to accomodate Jewish voters (especially Gingrich sugardaddy Sheldon Adelson).

Let's say your young, single and Jewish and looking for love. You've tried JDate, Match.com and maybe even TheJMom.com. Maybe the matchmaking rabbis can help.

Is BYU going to lose its cougar mascot? Probably not, but another Utah school rejected the cougar mascot because they deemed it offensive to women. See: Cox, Courtney.

Iran is cracking down on toy stores that sell Barbie dolls — too racy and too Western for their Islamic sensitivities, they say. Meanwhile, over on the Gaza Strip, Hamas has banned contestants from appearing on the Palestinian version of American Idol because it's too immodest. 

Oh, and don't forget Indonesia, where a man who wrote on his Facebook page that God does not exist was charged with blasphemy.

B16 issued a stern warning over the threat of “radical secularism” in American politics and culture to a visiting delegation of U.S. bishops. Jeffrey John, an openly gay (and celibate) British churchman may sue the Church of England for discrimination after he twice was passed over for a bishop's post because of his sexual orientation. 

— Kevin Eckstrom