AUSTIN, Texas (RNS) — Three Houston mothers are suing to stop displaying the Ten Commandments in Texas public school classrooms, arguing it violates the state’s religious freedom law and a voter-approved parental rights amendment. Their lawsuit is the latest challenge to Senate Bill 10 — this time under Texas law. Other attempts to prohibit the…
(RNS) — Almost immediately after the Trump administration’s Religious Liberty Commission released its draft 224-page report Friday (June 26), several faith and civic leaders responded with criticism. “The report and the commission behind it fail to represent and uplift the importance of religious diversity and tolerance for all faiths in our country — not just…
(RNS and Uncloseted) — Jacob May remembers sitting across from his pastor at 22-years-old in 2014 at a Chipotle in rural Virginia defending his gay identity over a carnitas burrito. They went over the usual talking points, with his pastor pointing to the clobber passages — the Bible verses used to condemn homosexuality — and…
(RNS) — Roughly a third of the way into Steven Spielberg’s new blockbuster film “Disclosure Day,” which focuses on the theoretical release of evidence documenting the existence of alien life, a conversation between the two main characters takes a sudden turn toward the spiritual. One of the characters, who is Catholic, begins fretting over what…
AUSTIN, Texas (RNS) — In 2016, 89-year-old Opal Lee walked from Fort Worth, Texas, to Washington, D.C., in hopes of establishing Juneteenth as a national holiday. Partly due to her efforts, it became one in 2021. Juneteenth commemorates June 19, 1865, when the nation’s last enslaved people in Texas learned of their freedom. The news…
A new report shows more countries saw spikes in religious hostility by individuals and groups in 2023, the last year for which data is available — with the rise attributable in part to harassment of religious minorities and the ongoing impact of the Israel-Hamas war. At the same time, more governments have been cracking down…
(RNS) — Shortly after Cole Tomas Allen was identified as the armed man who sought to break into the White House Correspondents’ dinner, President Trump declared on Fox News, “He had a lot of hatred in his heart for quite a while. And he just, I don’t know. He just, it was a religious thing….
We meet Kneecap backstage at Kingston’s Circuit ahead of an intimate album launch show on St George’s Day (no reader, they do not celebrate). It’s been about a year and half since we last spoke. “A pretty uneventful few months I must say,” jokes Mo Chara, given the lifetime of headlines and controversy the Belfast rap…
The challenges the church faces in dealing with social media influencers are not new. In fact, the Gospels suggest they extend back before the roots of Christianity. In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus condemns religious figures who “on the outside look righteous to others, but inside … are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness” (Matthew 23:27-28). The…
(The Conversation) — As the United States marks the 250th anniversary of its independence, old questions have returned about who belongs and whose religious practices are truly protected in the country. At the start of the year, an arson attack significantly damaged the oldest synagogue in Mississippi. Two days later, local officials in Oklahoma rejected…
