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Category: Religion

U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops calls for ceasefire ahead of Easter

U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops calls for ceasefire ahead of Easter

Middle East Eye reports: The US Conference of Catholic Bishops has called for a ceasefire in Gaza ahead of the Christian Easter holidays. “Thousands of innocent people have died in this conflict, and thousands more have been displaced and face tremendous suffering. This must stop,” the group said in a statement. “To move forward, a cease fire and a permanent cessation of war and violence is absolutely necessary. To move forward, those held hostage must be released and civilians must…

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The political earthquake that could shatter Netanyahu’s coalition

The political earthquake that could shatter Netanyahu’s coalition

Yair Rosenberg writes: The most controversial Israeli comedy sketch of the current war is just 88 seconds long. Aired in February on Eretz Nehederet, Israel’s equivalent of Saturday Night Live, it opens with two ashen-faced officers knocking on the door of a nondescript apartment, ready to deliver devastating news to the inhabitants. The officers are greeted by an ultra-Orthodox Jewish man who is similarly stricken when he sees them. “I’ve been terrified of this knock,” he says. “Ever since the…

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Israeli rabbi calls for killing all Palestinians in Gaza

Israeli rabbi calls for killing all Palestinians in Gaza

  He’s not just head of a yeshiva; he’s head of a hesder yeshiva. Many yeshiva students do not serve in the military, but hesder yeshivas combine Torah study with military service. So young military recruits are being taught that genocide is a religious duty. https://t.co/gpzBny5pkv — Barnett R. Rubin (@BRRubin) March 10, 2024 They are proud to murder a 73-year-old deaf man. That's the type of savagery we are facing in Gaza https://t.co/VRxeW1DYTh — Khalil Sayegh (@KhalilJeries) March 9,…

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Chief Sephardic rabbi says ultra-Orthodox will leave Israel if forced into army

Chief Sephardic rabbi says ultra-Orthodox will leave Israel if forced into army

The Times of Israel reports: Chief Sephardic Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef warned Saturday that ultra-Orthodox Jews will leave Israel en masse if the government ends exemptions of mandatory military enlistment enjoyed by the community. “If they force us to go to the army, we’ll all move abroad,” Yosef said during a weekly lecture. “We’ll buy a ticket… We’ll go there.” “The [biblical] tribe of Levi was exempted from the army,” he noted by way of comparison, referring to the biblical tribe…

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Evangelicals’ Trump worship looks more like QAnon every day

Evangelicals’ Trump worship looks more like QAnon every day

Ron Filipowski writes: I have watched every Donald Trump rally, interview, and speech since he left the White House in Jan. 2021. It’s certainly been interesting to observe the evolution of his political messaging over that time—as he went from desperately trying to resuscitate his political image and career in 2021 following the Jan. 6 attack, to reclaiming his role of Republican kingmaker through his use of primary endorsements in 2022, to crafting his rally speeches and policy positions in…

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A plurality of Americans are not affiliated with any religion

A plurality of Americans are not affiliated with any religion

NPR reports: When Americans are asked to check a box indicating their religious affiliation, 28% now check ‘none.’ A new study from Pew Research finds that the religiously unaffiliated – a group comprised of atheists, agnostic and those who say their religion is “nothing in particular” – is now the largest cohort in the U.S. They’re more prevalent among American adults than Catholics (23%) or evangelical Protestants (24%). Back in 2007, Nones made up just 16% of Americans, but Pew’s…

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King Bibi, false messiah

King Bibi, false messiah

David Stromberg writes: Watching Bibi speak ever since October 7, one senses that, for far too long, he has been told that he is King Bibi—and that he truly believes in the prophetic claims of his role as Israel’s unrivaled and divinely installed leader. Even though Bibi is not religious, he presides over the most religiously extreme and messianic coalition in Israel’s history, a throwback to the kind of ideologically tainted mysticism invoked by Nathan of Gaza to elevate Sabbatai…

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Sufis still gather in Afghanistan

Sufis still gather in Afghanistan

Annika Schmeding writes: My introduction into the world of Afghanistan’s Sufism began in 2015, over lunch with my friend Rohullah, the director of a research institute in Kabul. I had been working in Afghanistan in various sectors from government to nongovernmental jobs, and had returned to explore topics for a PhD that I had embarked on, a year prior. I asked what had happened to Afghanistan’s Sufis. Were they all gone? Afghanistan had, after all, once been the cradle of…

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Public Christian schools? Leonard Leo’s allies advance a new cause

Public Christian schools? Leonard Leo’s allies advance a new cause

Politico reports: Groups aligned with the conservative legal movement and its financial architect, Leonard Leo, are working to promote a publicly funded Christian school in Oklahoma, hoping to create a test case to change the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the First Amendment’s separation of church and state. At issue is the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Oklahoma’s push to create the St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School, which would be the nation’s first religious school entirely funded by taxpayers. The…

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Palestinian Christian pastor slams Western silence on genocide in Gaza

Palestinian Christian pastor slams Western silence on genocide in Gaza

  Through the Christmas holiday, Israel continued its relentless bombardment and siege of the Gaza Strip that has seen over 20,000 Palestinians killed. In the West Bank, we speak with Reverend Munther Isaac, pastor at the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bethlehem, which canceled Christmas festivities in the storied birthplace of Jesus to mourn the deaths in Gaza and received worldwide attention for their nativity scene depicting the baby Jesus surrounded by rubble. “Christianity started here and never ceased to exist…

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In Christmas Day message, pope decries Gaza’s ‘appalling harvest’ of civilian deaths

In Christmas Day message, pope decries Gaza’s ‘appalling harvest’ of civilian deaths

Reuters reports: Pope Francis said in his Christmas message on Monday that children dying in wars, including in Gaza, are the “little Jesuses of today” and that Israeli strikes there were reaping an “appalling harvest” of innocent civilians. In his Christmas Day “Urbi et Orbi” (to the city and world) address, Francis also called the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Hamas militants “abominable” and again appealed for the release of around 100 hostages still being held in Gaza. Speaking…

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The rising threat of Christian nationalism

The rising threat of Christian nationalism

Tim Alberta writes: This Christmas season, I have been reflecting on the words of my favorite author, C. S. Lewis, who once observed: “I have learned now that while those who speak about one’s miseries usually hurt, those who keep silence hurt more.” Speaking about American evangelicalism was never my intention. Having grown up steeped in Christianity’s right-wing subculture—the son of a megachurch minister, a follower of Jesus, someone who self-identified as “evangelical” since childhood—I was a reliable defender of…

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Message to the world from Bethlehem: ‘STOP this Genocide NOW’

Message to the world from Bethlehem: ‘STOP this Genocide NOW’

  Christ in the Rubble — A Liturgy of Lament Rev. Dr. Munther Isaac Evangelical Lutheran Christmas Church Bethlehem Saturday December 23rd, 2023 We are angry… We are broken… This should have been a time of joy; instead, we are mourning. We are fearful. More than 20,000 killed. Thousands are still under the rubble. Close to 9,000 children killed in the most brutal ways. Day after day. 1.9 million displaced! Hundreds of thousands of homes destroyed. Gaza as we know…

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Pope laments war in Holy Land on solemn Christmas Eve

Pope laments war in Holy Land on solemn Christmas Eve

Reuters reports: Pope Francis lamented war in the land of the birth of Jesus on Sunday, where Christmas Eve brought only fresh bloodshed and an intensification of fighting across the length of the Gaza Strip. Hours before midnight tolled for Christmas in the Holy Land, Palestinian health officials reported at least 70 dead in an Israeli airstrike on central Gaza. The Israeli military spokesperson’s office said it was looking into the report. Israel reported the highest two-day death toll for…

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Syrians cancel Christmas festivities in solidarity with war-battered Gaza

Syrians cancel Christmas festivities in solidarity with war-battered Gaza

The New Arab reports: Christmas cheer has deserted the streets of Syria’s cities, where the main churches have limited celebrations to prayers in solidarity with Palestinians suffering war in Gaza. “In Palestine, the birthplace of Jesus Christ, people are suffering,” the Syriac Catholic Archbishop of Aleppo, Mor Dionysius Antoine Shahda, told AFP. The northern Syrian city’s central district of Azizia is usually home to a bustling festive market and a huge Christmas tree, while its streets are adorned with lights…

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Pope condemns Israeli attack on Catholic church in Gaza as ‘terrorism’

Pope condemns Israeli attack on Catholic church in Gaza as ‘terrorism’

  BBC News reports: Civilians trapped in a church in Gaza City are living in an “unreal” sense of fear, a relative of one of those confined there has said. Fifi Saba, whose sister is trapped inside the Holy Family Church, said people were scared to move out of fear of being shot. A mother and her daughter were killed inside the church by sniper fire on Saturday, the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem said. Pope Francis condemned the attack. “A…

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