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Category: Religion

How Opus Dei conquered Washington D.C.

How Opus Dei conquered Washington D.C.

Nina Burleigh writes: In 1998, a prematurely silver-haired, baby-faced priest named C. John McCloskey was dispatched by Opus Dei, the secretive right-wing Roman Catholic group, to Washington, D.C., to minister to some of the world’s most powerful men. He arrived at the Catholic Information Center, which the organization runs, on K Street, the lobbying district of the nation’s capital, to act as a kind of lobbyist for the nation’s soul. Before being ordained, the priest had spent a few years…

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Trump’s lies about Haitian immigrants are another test for America’s Christians

Trump’s lies about Haitian immigrants are another test for America’s Christians

Russell Moore writes: The accusation that Haitian immigrants in a small Ohio city are abducting and eating their neighbors’ cats and dogs relies not on one falsehood but on a web of them. The rhetoric evokes racist tropes about “savages” who do not conform to our civilized Western world. There’s also a religious angle: the idea that Haitian refugees are voodoo occultists who might be worshipping the devil. As an evangelical Christian who actually believes in the existence of Satan,…

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Washington lobbyists battle over future of the Orthodox Church in Ukraine

Washington lobbyists battle over future of the Orthodox Church in Ukraine

The Washington Post reports: When JD Vance became the Republican nominee for vice president, a speech he gave in April condemning the Ukrainian government for what he claimed was an “assault on traditional Christian communities” became a rallying cry for lobbyists hired by a lawyer of an ally of the Russian Orthodox patriarch. “We commend Vance for taking a strong position on this issue and urge you to follow suit,” said a July 17 email sent to lawmakers on Capitol…

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Christian group recruits ‘Trojan horse’ election skeptics as U.S. poll workers

Christian group recruits ‘Trojan horse’ election skeptics as U.S. poll workers

The Guardian reports: A Christian political operative has teamed up with charismatic preachers to enroll election skeptics as poll workers across the country, using a Donald Trump-aligned swing state tour to enlist support in the effort. Joshua Standifer, who leads the group called Lion of Judah, describes the effort as a “Trojan horse” strategy to get Christians in “key positions of influence in government like Election Workers”, which will help them identify alleged voter fraud and serve as “the first…

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How I’ve been convincing Christians they don’t have to vote Republican

How I’ve been convincing Christians they don’t have to vote Republican

Doug Pagitt writes: Central to our work at Vote Common Good, I spend a lot of my time traveling the country speaking to voters, particularly evangelical and Catholic voters who are hardwired into voting Republican, working to get them to break out of those patterns. What I’ve learned is that most don’t want or need their elected leader to be like them, but they really do want their leader to like them. It wasn’t clear that Secretary of State Hillary…

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Former Rep. Andy Levin: ‘The acid test for Jewish people is, how do we treat our Palestinian cousins?’

Former Rep. Andy Levin: ‘The acid test for Jewish people is, how do we treat our Palestinian cousins?’

  We speak with former Michigan Congressmember Andy Levin, a former synagogue president, who lost his 2022 Democratic primary in a race that saw millions spent by pro-Israel groups to unseat the progressive Jewish lawmaker. AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and other lobby groups have used the same playbook over the years to defeat members of Congress who do not toe the line, and Levin says the Democratic Party has to act to stop such “dark money” from…

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Kamala Harris ‘always understood that Jesus and justice go together’

Kamala Harris ‘always understood that Jesus and justice go together’

The Associated Press reports: Black clergy who know Vice President Kamala Harris, now the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination, marvel at the fusion of traditions and teachings that have molded her religious faith and social justice values. A Baptist married to a Jewish man, she’s inspired by the work of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and influenced by the religious traditions of her mother’s native India as well as the Black Church. “She’s had the best of two…

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Inside Ziklag, the secret organization of wealthy Christians trying to sway the election and change the country

Inside Ziklag, the secret organization of wealthy Christians trying to sway the election and change the country

By Andy Kroll, ProPublica, and Nick Surgey, Documented This story was originally published by ProPublica. A network of ultrawealthy Christian donors is spending nearly $12 million to mobilize Republican-leaning voters and purge more than a million people from the rolls in key swing states, aiming to tilt the 2024 election in favor of former President Donald Trump. These previously unreported plans are the work of a group named Ziklag, a little-known charity whose donors have included some of the wealthiest…

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Israel’s top court rules ultra-Orthodox Jews must be drafted into military, in blow to Netanyahu

Israel’s top court rules ultra-Orthodox Jews must be drafted into military, in blow to Netanyahu

CNN reports: Israel’s Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered the government to draft ultra-Orthodox Jews into the military, delivering a blow to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that has the potential to unravel his ruling coalition. The court also ordered the government to withdraw funding from any religious schools, or yeshivas, whose students do not comply with draft notices. “The government wanted to distinguish at the level of law enforcement between individuals based on their group affiliation,” the court said in its…

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Churches accuse Israel of ‘coordinated attack’ on Christian presence in the Holy Land

Churches accuse Israel of ‘coordinated attack’ on Christian presence in the Holy Land

The Associated Press reports: Leaders of major churches have accused Israeli authorities of launching a “coordinated attack” on the Christian presence in the Holy Land by initiating tax proceedings against them. While Israeli officials have tried to dismiss the disagreement as a routine financial matter, the churches say the move upsets a centuries-old status quo and reflects mounting intolerance for the tiny Christian presence in the Holy Land. In a letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week, the heads…

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In Trump we trust. The religious right on a crusade to make their man president

In Trump we trust. The religious right on a crusade to make their man president

The Observer reports: God’s army is on the march. And many of its foot soldiers are wearing “Make America great again” regalia, sensing that their unlikely standard-bearer, former US president Donald Trump, is once again close to the promised land. “I do not believe that America can survive another four years of Joe Biden,” Ralph Reed, founder and chair of the Faith & Freedom Coalition, told a gathering of the religious right in Washington on Friday. “I haven’t felt this way since…

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‘If the land is sick, so are we’: Australian First Nations spirituality explained

‘If the land is sick, so are we’: Australian First Nations spirituality explained

By Joshua Waters, Deakin University First Nations peoples have been present on the Australian continent for more than 65,000 years. During this time, they have managed to develop and maintain continuous, unbroken connections with the land, water and sky. Understanding the deep interrelatedness between humans and their (human and nonhuman) kin and ancestors instilled a sense of responsibility, through custodianship of their environment. The aim of this was to survive, and to promote a sense of ecological and cosmological balance….

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Why the Southern Baptists’ vote opposing IVF could change national politics

Why the Southern Baptists’ vote opposing IVF could change national politics

Politico reports: The Southern Baptist Convention, the nation’s largest and most politically powerful Protestant denomination, voted Wednesday to oppose in vitro fertilization. The move may signal the beginning of a broad turn on the right against IVF, an issue that many evangelicals, anti-abortion advocates and other social conservatives see as the “pro-life” movement’s next frontier — one they hope will eventually lead to restrictions, or outright bans, on IVF at the state and federal levels. The vote comes as Democrats…

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Christian supremacists in the New Apostolic Reformation pose ‘greatest threat to American democracy you’ve never heard of’

Christian supremacists in the New Apostolic Reformation pose ‘greatest threat to American democracy you’ve never heard of’

HuffPost reports: A growing Christian supremacist movement that labels its perceived enemies as “demonic” and enjoys close ties to major Republican figures is “the greatest threat to American democracy you’ve never heard of,” according to a new report from the Southern Poverty Law Center. The SPLC, a civil rights organization that monitors extremist groups, released its “Year In Hate And Extremism 2023” report on Tuesday. A significant portion of the report, which tracked burgeoning anti-democratic and neo-fascist movements and actors…

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Over 600 Israeli extremists storm Al-Aqsa Mosque during Jewish Passover holiday

Over 600 Israeli extremists storm Al-Aqsa Mosque during Jewish Passover holiday

The New Arab reports: Over 600 Israeli extremists stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem early on Sunday, the Islamic Endowment Department which runs the holy site said. The storming coincided with the sixth day of the week-long Jewish holiday of Passover, The extremists performed Talmudic rituals in the mosque’s courtyards under the protection of Israeli forces, the department said. Video clips shared online showed the extremists entering the site, considered the third holiest in Islam. Many prominent extremist Israeli figures…

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Naomi Klein: Jews must raise voices for Palestine and oppose the ‘false idol of Zionism’

Naomi Klein: Jews must raise voices for Palestine and oppose the ‘false idol of Zionism’

  Hundreds of protesters were arrested in Brooklyn on Tuesday when Jewish New Yorkers and allies gathered for what they called a “Seder in the Streets to Stop Arming Israel” on the second night of Passover. The demonstration, held one block away from the home of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, came just hours before the Senate overwhelmingly approved a $95 billion foreign aid package that includes about $17 billion in arms and security funding to Israel. “Too many of…

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