(ANALYSIS) After several years of conversations while traveling nationwide, Father Andrew Stephen Damick is convinced these ancient prayers are painfully relevant to many converts surging into the small, but now growing, Eastern Church in America. It is no longer unusual to meet converts who have worshipped other gods and spirits.
Read More(ANALYSIS) I keep a little list in the notes app on my phone — just a running log of potential ideas for the newsletter. Most of them are only a few words, just enough to remind me to poke around in the data when I get back to my computer. If I’m being honest, about 75% of those ideas go nowhere. Either the data doesn’t tell a compelling story, or that “great dataset” someone mentioned turns out to be nothing like they described.
Read MoreOn the same day the breakfast concluded, a local news outlet reported that two Armenian opposition podcasters had been placed in pre-trial detention. Vazgen Saghatelyan and Narek Samsonyan, co-hosts of the “Imnemnimi” podcast, had been arrested over comments made in a Nov. 10 episode about National Assembly Speaker Alen Simonyan.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Nine in 10 Americans gather around a table to share food on Thanksgiving. At this polarizing moment, anything that promises to bring Americans together warrants our attention. The emphasis on the Pilgrims’ 1620 landing and 1621 feast erased a great deal of religious history and narrowed conceptions of who belongs in America — at times excluding groups such as Native Americans, Catholics and Jews.
Read More(ANALYSIS) For Orthodox Christians in America, the 20th century was shaped by waves of believers fleeing wars, revolutions and persecution in lands such as Greece, Syria, Russia and Romania. These days, the catechumenate class numbers are staggering. While some Orthodox parishes are shrinking, many clergy are struggling to handle congregations that have doubled or tripled in size.
Read MoreBroadly, the three nations persistently harass religious communities through surveillance, threats of imprisonment, arbitrary detentions and arrests, control of religious messages including sermons and public attacks. The nations enact laws that unjustly restrict the activities and legal status of religious groups; practice favoritism in attempts to control messaging and deny religious freedom to prisoners.
Read More(ANALYSIS) A majority of mainline Protestant Christians voted for Donald Trump in 2024. They also supported him in 2020 and 2016. In fact, even during Barack Obama’s landslide election in 2008, the mainline was evenly divided at the ballot box.
Read MoreA group of faith leaders has sent a letter to President Donald Trump thanking him for his recent designation of Nigeria as a “Country of Particular Concern.”
Read More(ANALYSIS) It would be a mistake to assume that everyone in these movements adheres to one viewpoint, or is interested only in stopping abortion. In reality, there are many motivations that lead to people using the phrase “pro-life.” When reporters asked Pope Leo, he said, “It’s important to look at many issues that are related to the teachings of the church.”
Read MoreIn an attempt to better understand Mercy Culture’s approach to recruiting candidates, two journalists from the Fort Worth Report purchased and completed the more than five-hour Campaign University course and listened to hours of the For Liberty & Justice podcast. What became clear in the course is For Liberty & Justice’s mission to push Christian conservative values beyond church doors and into the public sphere.
Read More(ANALYSIS) The Oversight Board, a body making precedent-setting content moderation decisions on the social media platforms Facebook, Instagram and Threads, issued a decision calling on Meta to mitigate information asymmetries in armed conflicts. The Oversight Board is a body examining whether Meta’s decisions are in line with its policies, values and human rights commitments.
Read More(ANALYSIS) President Trump recently designated Nigeria as a "Country of Particular Concern" under the International Religious Freedom Act. Like most of his acts, this ignited major controversy, much of it reflecting longstanding and now renewed disputes about what is really happening in that country.
Read MoreIn the last decade, more than a dozen coups have shaken West Africa and the Sahel. Amid this turmoil, religious leaders are emerging as stabilizers who are guiding dialogue and providing a moral compass in societies caught between soldiers and fractured civilian states.
Read More(ANALYSIS) In recent years, litigation on certain types of religious freedom lawsuits have been practically run of the mill: prayer on school premises, for example, and government funding for students at faith-based schools.
Read MoreThe uproar over Tucker Carlson’s decision to host Nick Fuentes, a notorious Holocaust denier and white nationalist, for a friendly chat on his popular online talk show last week focused on the need to maintain a firewall between mainstream conservatives and antisemites such as Fuentes.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Street protests spill into riots. Universities host intimidation campaigns. Digital mobs savage anyone who dares step outside the script. Across America, political anger is spilling into the open, and on the left it increasingly takes a violent shape. What begins as dissent can tip quickly into destruction.
Read MorePresident Donald Trump designated Nigeria a Country of Particular Concern (CPC) Oct. 31 for tolerating religious freedom violations especially against Christians, and threatened sanctions and military force to discourage such persecution.
Read More(ANALYSIS) As media pundits over-interpret the nationwide impact of elections in New York City, New Jersey, Virginia and California, let’s contemplate this: What do the data on religious dynamics say about prospects for a rather demoralized Democratic Party in 2026-2032, and whether a more centrist strategy might help?
Read MoreThe World Council of Churches’ Faith and Order Conference, held in Egypt to mark the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, brought together a wide range of Christian leaders over five days in search of renewed unity. Yet, as inspiring as the goal may have been, the path toward visible Christian unity remains fraught with challenges — theological, historical, cultural and even practical.
Read More(ANALYSIS) I’ve always found survey questions about prayer in public schools somewhat difficult to interpret because the context matters so much. For example, what if a local school district simply offers a quiet time for students to meditate or read? Students could choose to pray during this period, but it wouldn’t be mandatory. Or what if the teacher guides the class in a moment of self-reflection, encouraging students to set their intentions for the day?
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