Weekend Plug-in 🔌

Editor’s note: Every Friday, “Weekend Plug-in” features analysis, fact checking and top headlines from the world of faith. Subscribe now to get this newsletter delivered straight to your inbox. Got feedback or ideas? Email Bobby Ross Jr. at therossnews@gmail.com.

(ANALYSIS) Last week, we set the scene for the U.S. Supreme Court’s hearing of a religious freedom case involving a Texas death-row inmate.

This week, we summarize the court’s mixed response to that inmate’s case.

Christianity Today’s Daniel Silliman lays out the plot aptly:

If you give a man in a Texas execution chamber the right to a prayer, is he entitled to two?

Can he ask for candles?

Or Communion?

If the United States Supreme Court says a condemned man has the religious right to have his pastor touch his foot while the state injects a lethal dose of chemicals into his veins, then will the court also have to allow a pastor to touch a man’s hand, his head, or even the place where the needle pierces the skin?

The justices quizzed attorney Seth Kretzer about the slippery slope of death penalty prayer on Tuesday morning, as they weighed whether the First Amendment and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA), passed by Congress in 2000, give 37-year-old John Henry Ramirez the right to have his pastor lay hands on him and pray aloud when the state of Texas puts him to death.

The high court was skeptical of the inmate’s “demand that his pastor be allowed to pray out loud and touch him during his execution,” according to The Associated Press’ Jessica Gresko.

Justice Clarence Thomas raised concerns “about inmates ‘gaming the system’ by asserting dubious religious claims that served to delay their executions, notes the Wall Street Journal’s Jess Bravin.

The court “seemed divided,” explains the Washington Post’s Robert Barnes, who produced a “deeply reported and evocative” advance piece on the case, reporting from Corpus Christi, Texas.

See more insightful coverage from the New York Times’ Adam Liptak, the Texas Tribune’s Jolie McCullough and the Deseret News’ Kelsey Dallas.

A ruling isn’t expected for several months.

Power Up: The Week’s Best Reads

1. How Virginia Gov.-elect Glenn Youngkin won more of the evangelical vote than Trump did: “The most explicitly evangelical candidate in the modern Virginia party since World War II” — that’s how one source characterizes Youngkin in this revealing post-op by Washington Post religion writer Sarah Pulliam Bailey.

Bailey details how Youngkin’s focus on critical race theory and public education resonated with White evangelicals.

2. Inside a Muslim community’s effort to rein in the FBI: I’ve mentioned this before, but the Deseret News’ Kelsey Dallas has developed a strong niche covering religious freedom.

“In FBI v. Fazaga, the Supreme Court is taking a closer look at government surveillance,” Dallas notes in this narrative piece, which opens with the compelling scene of an FBI informant infiltrating a Southern California mosque.

3. For Christian birdwatchers, aka ‘ornitheoligists,’ religion takes flight: “For many, the relationship between birds and Christianity does not stray farther than seeing a dove carrying an olive branch on a banner at church,” Religion News Service’s Jessica Mundie explains. “However, for Christian birdwatchers, this link is alive.”

This story is deeper and filled with more theological insight than I expected when I clicked the link. That’s a compliment.

BONUS: “The major branches of Buddhism are often known as “vehicles,” or ways of spiritual practice,” The Associated Press’ Peter Smith writes from McCandless, Pennsylvania.

“So it’s only fitting that when the monks of the Pittsburgh Buddhist Center needed a major restoration of its outdoor statue of the Buddha, they turned to an auto restoration shop specializing in classic cars.”

More Top Reads

• Arkansas church celebrates unity, diversity with international food festival (by Frank Lockwood, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette)

• America’s youth are religious. They’re spiritual. But they don’t trust institutions (by Mya Jaradat, Deseret News)

• Senators call for federal investigation into Liberty University’s handling of sexual assaults. school promises independent probe (by Hannah Dreyfus, ProPublica)

• For 100 years, The BLVD 'has sustained itself with the help of God' (by Katherine Burgess, Commercial Appeal)

• Jeff Bezos is quizzed on ’emotional’ rocket ride and economics of space flight (by Jack Jenkins, Religion News Service)

• Brothers in arms, brothers in Christ (by Hamil R. Harris and Erik Tryggestad, Christian Chronicle)

• Tennessee pastor tackles man who pointed gun at people during church service, police say (by Rachel Wegner and Natalie Neysa Alund, USA Today)

• ‘What fear?’: Hindus bathe in frothy, polluted Indian river (by Shonal Ganguly and Altaf Qadri, Associated Press)

• Some churches got mega PPP loans. A few got tiny ones (by Bob Smietana, RNS)

• Religious groups say implementing Biden’s vaccine mandate would be ‘sin against God’s Holy Word’ (by Dennis Romboy, Deseret News)

• Amid COVID-19, most churches provide hybrid worship, half stopped picnics (by Adelle M. Banks, RNS)

• Grace Chapel restructures in wake of controversial founding pastor's departure (by Liam Adams, The Tennessean) 

Inside The Godbeat: Behind The Bylines

Sam Kestenbaum, who reports on religion for the New York Times and other publications, talks to The Revealer’s Kali Handelman.

As Kestenbaum’s award-winning stories tends to be, it’s a fascinating discussion.

Charging Station: In Case You Missed It

Here is where you can catch up on recent news and opinions from Religion Unplugged.

 • Veterans Day: How crosses and mementos help these Marines remember fallen soldiers (by Katrina Finkelstein and Derek H. Alderman)

• Tennessee man makes a ministry of carrot cakes (by Ken Beck)

• Bangladesh needs to be held accountable for violence against Hindus (by Deepali Kulkarni)

• Video: plague, fire and flood: This Bronx church triumphs over them all (by Sofia Kioko and Bethany Johnson)

• YouVersion Bible app becomes first faith-based app to hit 500 million installations (by Jillian Cheney)

• Many scientists are atheists, but that doesn’t mean they are anti-religious (by Elaine Howard Ecklund)

• Another big Supreme Court case: State aid for students attending religious schools (by Richard Ostling)

• God is meta — Zuckerberg's company, not so much (by Michael Metzger)

• In Crimea, Jehovah's Witnesses jailed for 'extremism,' sent to Russian labor camps (by Felix Corley)

• Human Rights institute is helping women escape Afghanistan, but states must do more (by Ewelina U. Ochab)

• How a Catholic schoolboy became an Anglican bishop — then a Catholic priest (by Terry Mattingly)

The Final Plug

Here’s a shameless plug for one of my own stories: a piece on a Michigan ministry that pickets abortion clinics and urges women not to end their pregnancies.

In related coverage for The Christian Chronicle, Kenneth Pybus and I explore whether the U.S. Supreme Court might soon overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 ruling that legalized abortion nationwide.

Happy Friday, everyone! Enjoy the weekend.

Bobby Ross Jr. is a columnist for Religion Unplugged and editor-in-chief of The Christian Chronicle. A former religion writer for The Associated Press and The Oklahoman, Ross has reported from all 50 states and 15 nations. He has covered religion since 1999.