Politics
The suicide of former Peruvian President Alan García Pérez marks an unprecedented event in the country’s political history. García shot himself inside of his home when police arrived to arrest him for reports that he was the recipient of bribes in a corruption case known as “Lavajato.”
(COMMENTARY) Mayor Buttigieg of South Bend, Indiana - an openly gay man - has soared from obscurity to a talking point about whether the religious left can unite like the religious right did around Ronald Reagan.
(NEWS ANALYSIS) The country’s incumbent president Jokowi, seen as a liberal “metalhead of state”, chose conservative Muslim cleric Ma’ruf Amin as his running mate to win votes from an increasingly conservative Indonesia. Meanwhile, Jokowi’s challenger Subianto has been wooing radical Islamist groups.
(COMMENTARY) Before Monday’s fire in Paris, a string of arson cases and other acts of desecration took place inside Catholic churches in France during Lent. In a country with a recent history of terrorism, these incidents somehow didn’t warrant any kind of attention from American news organizations. Even major outlets with a presence in Paris failed to adequately do so.
(NEWS ANALYSIS) India’s general election opens polls April 11 to May 19, with the final count expected May 23. Leaders of India’s minority faith communities are telling their flocks to elect candidates committed to pluralism and respect for everybody’s faiths amidst growing intolerance blamed on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist party.
(COMMENTARY) While many Christians of various denominations have had to reconcile church teachings with that of who they prefer at the ballot box, the issue has not been fully explored in the mainstream press. At a time when pandering to one side is better for the bottom line, such journalistic discoveries of this grey zone are left underreported. Is covering both sides fueling political polarization?
Judge Noach Dear, an Orthodox Jew, and his court attorney Deema Azizi, a Syrian Muslim refugee, prefer to wear their religious garb - a yarmulke and hijab respectively. Their shared expressions for their faiths unites rather than divides them.
The Catholic church - as much a symbol of nationalism as religious struggle and freedom - is a mix of history and modernity, with LED-lit pillars and tombs for saints and fallen government officials. A museum dedicated to Poland’s most famous Catholics, Pope John Paul II and Blessed Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski, is set to open next month.
(COMMENTARY) Amid all the immorality, crime, violence and ultimately Michael Corleone’s final despair (for anyone who could sit through The Godfather III), this isn’t just a series of mob movies. The Godfather book and movie trilogy is loaded with religious symbolism.
(COMMENTARY) Much violence and discrimination against Christians globally goes unnoticed in newspapers. This could be seen with US Vice President Mike Pence’s recent remarks - hardly reported - condemning religious persecution of both Muslims and Christians.
Hindu nationalist extremist groups have been using building code regulations to shut down house churches across India. Pastors and their lawyers say they’re being unfairly targeted.
A new film tells Abby Johnson’s journey from being an award-winning director of a Planned Parenthood clinic in Texas to becoming an outspoken pro-life advocate.
(ANALYSIS) The most interesting figure in the culture wars today may be Patriarch Kirill from the Russian Orthodox Church, which with Russia has been promoting traditional Christian agendas on sexuality and abortion. This weekened the international non-profit World Congress of Families, founded by a Russian and an American, is hosting its annual meet to promote a pro-Christian worldview, conservative gender roles, anti-abortion policies and a hetero-normative agenda.
(COMMENTARY) Religious persecution of Christians is more than at any other time in modern history, while other groups like Muslims, Jehovah’s Witnesses and Jews also suffer discrimination and violence in different regions of intolerance.
(NEWS ANALYSIS) Israeli Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked released a satirical perfume ad jabbing at leftists who call her fascist, the country’s largest English daily labeled Israel’s democracy a joke and President Trump upended decades of U.S. policy in one tweet.
Broadcaster Robin Aitken says the BBC is so biased, it’s already helped destroy the religious and moral foundations of British culture. Can he be serious?
(COMMENTARY) The big story remains who knew what and when. Who’s implicated in potentially covering up the misdeeds of now-former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick over the years? The implication here is that the cover-up — if that’s the word you want to use — goes beyond Pope Francis, but back in time years to when Saint Pope John Paul II was the head of the Roman Catholic church.
(COMMENTARY) After the United Methodist Church’s decision to uphold its ban on same-sex marriage and clergy by only a narrow margin, what’s the status on other church policies globally?
Under Prime Minister Imran Khan, the Pakistani government aims to improve standards of education for even the most marginalized. It remains to be seen whether religious discrimination against Christian and Hindu students in the Islamic country will decrease.
(COMMENTARY) Fake news and biased reporting characterizes the military conflict between India and Pakistan, with some news channels parroting government claims that haven’t checked out.
(NEWS ANALYSIS) Nigeria’s election was polarized by a Muslim North and Christian South, with theories that the elected president Muhammadu Buhari will “Islamize” the country.
Should the head of a government live out his religious beliefs in office? The Tibetan President-in-Exile Lobsang Sangay argues that that does not necessarily violate the separation of Church and State or the freedom of religion or belief.
Ongoing Indonesian elections are marked by blasphemy convictions, political imprisonment and a patchwork of laws aimed at preventing pornography, ethnic conflict and religious persecution.
Every day, state control intensifies at every level. All forms of demonstrations are prohibited. Cities across Venezuela have become militarized zones littered with heavily-armed soldiers and tanks. My friends, who are also journalists, have been fired from reporting the truth.
David M. Bailey stood at the podium in the City Room of The King’s College in lower Manhattan, expressing his initial frustration with being black and Christian in America.
A lot has been said and written about Jackie Robinson. The baseball legend — famous for breaking baseball’s color barrier — was known for many things. His athletic abilities, courage in the face of racism and the dignity with which he went about it all remain the focal points. What is often ignored — even forgotten — is Robinson’s Christian faith.
(COMMENTARY) Russian Jehovah's Witnesses and Uighur Muslims in China are persecuted by their governments, in part because they’re seen as insufficiently loyal, and in part because the global community prioritizes good trade relations.
Historian Frances Fitzgerald reported on white evangelicals for The New Yorker. Now she’s written a book delving into their place in America’s founding and history, long before President Trump.
(COMMENTARY) Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam (D) favored a state bill that would allow ‘super’ late-term abortions. President Trump has since called for legislation to ban late-term abortions because the child can feel pain in the mother’s womb.
(COMMENTARY) Again, it was conservative Catholic media that proved to be the preferred mouthpiece for Cardinal Robert Sarah and Pope Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI over the past week. Both men — with help from right-leaning news organizations — have been very vocal about the problems plaguing the church.