Federal Cuts Spur Grantmaker Pledge To Fill the Gaps

In the wake of federal funding cuts affecting nonprofits, over 150 organizations have signed a pledge urging grantmakers to extend their support and funnel fresh funds to hard-hit advocacy groups that have lost federal contracts.

Understanding Accused Shooter Vance Boelter’s Ties To Christian Nationalism

(ANALYSIS) Details are still emerging about Vance Boelter, the 57-year-old man accused of killing a Minnesota state politician and her husband and grievously injuring another state senator and his wife. But the more we learn about Boelter, the more likely it seems that Christian nationalism may have played a role in motivating the attack.

Missouri Enacts Trey’s Law, Voiding NDAs for Child Sex Abuse Victims

Nondisclosure agreements (NDAs) for child sex abuse victims are no longer allowed in Missouri, thanks to a piece of new legislation known as Trey’s Law. It is in memory of Trey Carlock, a victim of abuse at Kanakuk Kamps in southwest Missouri, who took his own life in 2019 at the age of 28.

Crossroads Podcast: Democrats Courting Men Amid New ‘Culture Wars’ Era

In other words, the moral battle lines at the heart of America’s “culture wars” continue to shift and evolve. Maybe the editors at the Times should assign a religion-beat professional to the team that is covering these trends?

100 Years Ago, The Social Gospel Movement Helped Workers — And Promoted A Christian America

(ANALYSIS) Trump has praised the Gilded Age as a time of national prosperity thanks to tariffs, no income tax and few regulations. Similar to today, the late 19th century was a time where a small group of men enjoyed immense wealth, privilege and power to shape the nation. It was a time of immense inequality, as factory and housing conditions crushed the lives of the poor.

Why The Pope Matters In A World Of Rivalries

(OPINION) We are all curious to see how Pope Leo XIV will engage with the Trump administration. The Chicago Archdiocese’s upcoming celebration of the pope, an American-Peruvian dual citizen, stands in contrast to the military parade being hosted in Washington, D.C. on the same day. At the same time, the Catholic Church has seen empires rise and fall.

Israel’s Political Battle Over The Drafting Of Yeshiva Students

Many Jews are outraged that while the war in Gaza has been raging since Oct. 7, 2023 and they have suffered many casualties and interruptions to their civilian life in response to repeated reserve duty call-ups, their able-bodied ultra-Orthodox fellow citizens have not shared the defense burden. The IDF faces shortages, needing approximately 12,000 new recruits, including 7,000 combat soldiers.

How Trump Is Putting Hundreds Of Sacred Sites At Risk

The Trump administration has rolled back federal project review deadlines, putting Indigenous nations at risk of losing their voice in the development of infrastructure on their homelands. Meanwhile, the Trump administration is cutting funding for the national THPO program by 94%, leaving many Indigenous nations with limited resources to maintain their historic preservation efforts.

Do Popes Run A Secret Network Of ‘Spies’?

(ANALYSIS) Leo’s elevation broke the longstanding rule of thumb that no American, as a citizen of a superpower, could or even should become pope. But that did not trouble the College of Cardinals in May, and leading up to his election Cardinal Robert Prevost felt free to critique current American policies.

The Tension In India Between Free Speech And Religion

(ANALYSIS) A 22-year-old student has been charged with allegedly offending religious sentiments after making derogatory remarks about Islam and the Prophet Muhammad. Whatever the merits of the case, the incident raises an important question: Should the right to free speech include the right to criticize religion — one’s own or someone else’s?

Crossroads Podcast: Why Journalists Want To Talk About Orthodoxy And Guys

All many journalists want to talk about is “the guys.” That focus on young males swimming the Bosphorus has created plenty of mainstream news reports. This week’s “Crossroads” podcast focused on a BBC feature with this headline: “Young US men are joining Russian churches promising 'absurd levels of manliness'.”

New Wave Of Violence Targets Pakistan’s Ahmadi Community

The Ahmadiyya community in Pakistan has long experienced significant constraints on its religious practices. From not being allowed to call their places of worship “mosques” or use Islamic terms such as “Azan” (call to prayer) to not being able to vote because Ahmadis must either renounce their faith or agree to be placed on a separate electoral list categorizing them as “non-Muslim.”

‘Destroyed By Modernization’: Medieval Berlin’s Diverse Religious Roots Unearthed

Berlin faces growing intolerance of immigrants and their religions, especially Muslim Arabs from countries like Turkey and Syria. right-wing extremist political parties like the Alternative for Germany echo Nazi talking points and pine for a homogenous, white and Christian society. History, however, shows that such a time never existed.

2024 Election Post-Mortem: Latter-Day Saints

(ANALYSIS) I’ve written about this before, but it’s worth repeating here: Whenever I tweet a graph that contains a couple of the largest religious groups (evangelicals, Catholics, nonreligious), the first question that comes in the comments is inevitably, “Where are the Latter-day Saints?”

Pope Leo XIV Is American: Does That Matter?

How will Leo’s formative three decades in the United States before life in Peru and Rome shape his church of 1.4 billion souls? Yes, the cardinals must be thinking an American could solve the Holy See’s $98 million annual deficit, severely underfunded pensions, and declining donations. They may also hope his solid administrative experience might tame the curia, the Vatican’s notoriously Italianate “deep state.”

2024 Election Post-Mortem: Black Americans, Religion and the Vote

(ANALYSIS) The Black church in America is an entirely different culture than the average White evangelical or mainline tradition. Anyone who has attended a worship service in a Black church tradition knows that to be true. But beyond a difference in worship styles, there are many ways that the Black church should be considered its own category.

Crossroads Podcast: Screens, Sanity And Spiritual Silence In Our Kids

The bottom line: At some point, parents in traditional forms of faith are going to have to teach their children — the younger the better — that their their home is different from those in which many of their friends are being raised. That can be tough sledding, but these hard topics Will. Not. Go. Away.

Why Do Our Bibles Keep Changing?

(ANALYSIS) There are two reasons, translations and texts, both of which have cropped up in the news of religion this year. The venerable King James Version (KJV) appeared without changes over centuries. Today, experts continually reconsider the best available evidence to improve our English Bibles.

On Religion: The Collapse Of The Anglican Church In Canada

(ANALYSIS) In the year of our Lord 1967, the Anglican Church of Canada had 1,218,666 members and 272,400 worshippers on a typical Sunday. In a recent report, the church found 294,382 members on parish rolls and 58,871 people attending Sunday worship services. It has been decades since Anglicanism was a dominant form of Christianity in Canada.

GCU Cleared of $37.7M Federal Fine, Retains Tax-Exempt Status

A Christian university in Arizona is no longer on the hook for a $37.7 million federal fine, believed to be the largest-ever financial penalty imposed on a school. Grand Canyon University (GCU), said that on May 16, the U.S. Department of Education (ED) rescinded the massive penalty proposed for the Phoenix-based school in 2023.

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