Although roughly half of Indian-Americans are registered Democrats, a sizeable segment of the Hindu diaspora in the U.K. and U.S. have embraced much of Republican candidate Donald Trump’s agenda reports the online academic blog The Conversation (October 26). The Hindu right organization Hindu Sena (Hindu Army) in India went so far as to perform a […]
The geographic and spiritual mobility of leaders of New Age and alternative religious groups as well as the hybridization of symbolic references are shaping the practices and discourses of such groups write Swiss researchers Manéli Farahmand and Sybille Rouiller in an article published in the newly-released issue of the online journal New Diversities (18:1), published […]
If an individual switches his or her denomination once in his or her early years, he or she is more likely to do so again according to a study by Buster Smith of Catawba College and Chris Scheitle of West Virginia University presented at the late October meeting of the Society for the Scientific Study […]
Women are gaining a new place in churches in the former Soviet Union, often because of a lack of men involved, according to the East–West Church & Ministry Report (Fall). Protestant churches in the former Soviet Union have been among the most conservative, traditionally restricting the roles of women and requiring head coverings and segregated […]
In Asia, Buddhist and Taoist groups and movements have emerged as important actors in environmental protection, although they are drawing considerable opposition from governments in China and even India, according to historian Prasenjit Duara. In an interview with the New York Times (October 17), Duara says that in the last decade or two, Buddhist environmental […]
The spoof religion known as the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster was started to parody creationists and challenge establishment churches in Europe but is now taking on the shape of a religion itself reports the Atlantic (October). The parody religion, also known as the Pastafarians, started in the U.S. amidst the battle over teaching […]
The religious press, like the faith groups they represent, tended to move in predictable directions regarding their endorsements or support of this year’s presidential candidates. But the way in which the candidacy of Donald Trump has fared in the evangelical press—if not so much rank-and-file evangelicals—does stand out. Charisma magazine may have even caught its […]
Female atheists and secular humanists can be considered a minority of a minority—atheists representing a small proportion of the U.S. population and women comprising a small proportion of that number—but they have been reaching higher levels of involvement and leadership in secularist organizations in recent years. At the Women in Secularism conference meeting in Washington in late September, attended by RW, several speakers confirmed that women are more involved in organized atheist and secular humanist activism and communities even while there are still divisions over the role of feminism in the wider movement. This event was the fourth such conference, with its origin in 2010 over the concern that more strident voices of new atheists, who were viewed as demeaning women (and even having a role in cases of alleged sexual harassment at atheist events), were drowning out women’s issues. The clash between the more science-oriented new atheists and activist and social justice-oriented secularists was evident at the conference. Organizer Debbie Goddard told RW in an interview that the recent merger of the Center for Inquiry, the sponsor of the Women in Secularism conferences, and the new atheist-oriented Richard Dawkins Foundation has been a source of dissension among women in the movement, likely causing the recent gathering’s registration to hit a low of 80 participants. Past conferences put more stress on social activism, and several of the earlier activist and feminist leaders did not attend the event, Goddard added.
But other speakers reported on the new openness of women to atheism as the movement tries to draw on the swelling numbers of non-affiliated Americans. Melanie Brewster of Columbia University presented a paper on why men are more likely to be atheists than women. Prominent new atheist leaders such as Sam Harris have made controversial statements that the cerebral nature of atheism attracts men more than women, who are more “nurturing.” Brewster argued that whatever the reasons for the gap between male and female secularists (and religiosity), the differences are narrowing, especially in Western nations. She added that women may be experiencing a “time-lag” in secularization and only today are showing the drop off in religiosity. Another study she cited showed that women feel excluded from the atheist movement and need to see greater representation of atheist women in the media.
While politicians associated with the religious right have opposed resettlement of refugees from the civil war in Syria, evangelical congregations and relief organizations have increasingly engaged in such efforts. The Atlantic Monthly (September 11) reports that Republican nominee Donald Trump and more than 30 state governors have opposed President Obama’s resettlement program of taking in […]
The growing use of the hallucinogenic plant substance Ayahuasca in the West is coming in for criticism for commercializing an indigenous practice, as well as posing adverse affects for the uninitiated. While the widespread use of Ayahuasca is fairly recent, the controversy goes back a century to the clash between indigenous practitioners who use a […]
