Martin Marty: Sightings
Faith, Grace, and the Arts
By Martin E. Marty — May 7, 2013
Devoted to "public religion" or "religion-in-public," Sightings surveys public arenas that are not confined to the political world. Education, commerce, entertainment and the arts represent spheres where publics encounter religion.
The Infidel and the Indifferent
By Martin E. Marty — April 29, 2013
Thoughtful religious leaders have to work to promote affiliation and commitment as they seek and sometimes find company among the non-religious who would stir interest in the deeper things of life. This is a mission for them in a time of when gloss is favored in many sub-cultures.
Confidence in Religion Drops
By Martin E. Marty — April 22, 2013
Religious institutions cannot be at home in the public sphere to serve in it and expect to be given special treatment, if they ever could. There is no reason to expect that they can run for cover now and go unnoticed.
Evangelicals Change and Make Changes
By Martin E. Marty — April 16, 2013
When Will Herberg wrote the canonical book Protestant-Catholic-Jew in the mid-fifties, Evangelicals appeared to be marginal at best. In recent decades they make the news more often and they are more exploited by and influential among politicians and public life than are the many breeds of Protestants. Let’s look in on the Evangelicals.
Seminaries and the Future
By Martin E. Marty — April 8, 2013
News of theological seminaries does not usually appear in public media unless someone who is part of one of them creates scandal and cannot go unnoticed and not-covered. This week, therefore, this e-column has to take on a different character.
April Fools
By Martin E. Marty — April 1, 2013
Suppose I’d been unconscious since March 13 and just learned that there’d been a papal election. Suppose I asked “you” for details, you answered, and I responded.
Holy Week
By Martin E. Marty — March 25, 2013
Forget, for the moment, popes and budgets and March Madness, shall we? This week we dispense with headlines and blogs and releases, unless the latter are three-hundred or three-thousand years old.
Pope and Nones
By Martin E. Marty — March 19, 2013
"It behooves us to keep talking about the papal election for as long as possible. Once it's over, we're back to the federal budget deliberations, and I prefer a story in which nothing gets sequestered but the cardinals." Thus columnist Gail Collins spoke for many of us.
Selma: Sustaining the Momentum Still
By Martin E. Marty — March 15, 2013
"Selma: Sustaining the Momentum" was the title of a Dean Peerman and M.E.M. article in The Christian Century forty-eight years to the month after colleague Peerman and I joined several thousand protestors and prayers at the Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma, Alabama.
Christian Pop
By Martin E. Marty — February 25, 2013
Commenting on "Christian Pop," if one is not at home in it, is precarious and will doubtless reveal how out of it the commentator is. So I wander in with a sense of mission.
Crowds
By Martin E. Marty — February 19, 2013
Western European and North American crowds are midget and mini- compared to what goes on elsewhere and in other faiths.
Catholic Schools
By Martin E. Marty — February 12, 2013
What are we going to do with headlines referring to the crisis in American Catholic education?
Religion News: One Day
By Martin E. Marty — February 5, 2013
Originally posted on Sightings at the Martin Marty Center at the University of Chicago Divinity School. “Public Religion” or “Religion-in-Public,” our cause, appears in blogs, films, on TV and radio, and in zillions of sources which together dwarf the coverage in print media, our main source. Occasionally I sample them by reporting and reflecting on […]
Immigration Reform
By Martin E. Marty — January 27, 2013
Tomorrow is the beginning of what will be a congressional battle over immigration reform. The subject was rarely and lightly handled in the political wars last year, perhaps because both parties found other issues to be more important for the country or more exploitable by their candidates. Whoever thought that the issue would remain relatively […]
Divorce’s Toll
By Martin E. Marty — January 23, 2013
Last Wednesday the Chicago Tribune alerted readers to the release that day of an ambitious set of findings about the effects of divorce on children.
