A new survey of U.S. Jews finds that, while holding their own numerically, they are increasingly split between secularism and Orthodoxy, especially among the youngest adults. The survey by the Pew Research Center is a follow-up to its landmark 2013 study.
The view of ultra-Orthodox Judaism as a conservative force in Israeli society is only half the picture and does not account for the changes taking place among ultra-Orthodox women on reproductive and work decisions, writes Michal Raucher of Rutgers University in the online magazine The Conversation (May 17).
Facing disease and death, many in China have found solace in Buddhist teachings and practices during the pandemic, while the state has been careful to curb large gatherings at religious places, possibly not only for health reasons but also because of their potential for sparking criticism of the state’s handling of the crisis.
The journal Mormon Studies Review devotes most of its current issue (Vol. 8) to politics among Latter-day Saints, both on a global scale and in the American context. The lead article looks at how the rapid global expansion of Mormonism has had some impact on members’ political commitments. Laurie F. Maffy-Kipp writes that the LDS church has lived in the tension of maintaining an American uniformity of teachings, practices, and structure throughout the world (which non-Western converts value) while increasingly adapting to and innovating in different societies.
President Biden’s publicly visible faith and the polarized views of him among American Catholics reflect both a struggle within the faith over its direction and a political struggle over the Catholic vote. In a feature article in Time magazine (April 12/April 19), Brian Bennett notes that while they were formerly a reliably Democratic constituency, growing divisions among Catholics have made them a key target for both major parties, with Republicans seeking to win over Hispanic Catholics in particular as part of their effort to expand their voter base beyond older whites.
Choirs were one of the first casualties of the pandemic, and both their potential for being superspreaders and their loss of status in churches will likely prevent their full restoration in American religious life anytime soon. The New York Times Magazine (April 1) chronicles the story of one chorus in Washington state that was said to be one of the first superspreaders in the early days of Covid, while also describing how religious and secular choral music has been affected by the pandemic.
In a reverse mission strategy, Russian and other Slavic evangelical churches are growing in the U.S. as they reach beyond their immigrant base and seek to bring revival to other Americans, writes Adam Morris in Charisma magazine (April). Across the country, “pockets of Slavic Christians are building churches and spreading the gospel from their new home base.
The case of Cardinal Theodore McCarrick’s sexual abuse, and its cover-up by his fellow bishops and clerics reflects less a singular instance of clerical misbehavior than a vulnerable episcopal system in which “bad actors find it more or less easy to operate, survive, and thrive.” So write sociologist Stephen Bullivant and psychologist Giovanni Radhitio Putra Sadewo in the Catholic Herald (April 18), based on their study of episcopal networks surrounding McCarrick.
The worldviews supporting protests against measures (such as the compulsory wearing of masks) for preventing the pandemic in Germany appear to be more strongly influenced by alternative religious beliefs than by evangelical and rightwing ones, writes Kai Funkschmidt in Zeitschrift für Religion und Weltanschauung (2/2021).
Egypt’s Islamist organization, the Muslim Brotherhood, is facing a pattern of defecting members who are publicly speaking and writing about the group and facing few restrictions in doing so, writes Mustafa Menshawy in the journal Religions (12). In the aftermath of the Arab Spring and the election of Mohamed Morsi as the country’s president in 2012, the once-powerful Muslim Brotherhood has faced strong restrictions, including violent repression, as well as the defection of members.
