Christianity

Leave it to the religion writer who sees the Jesus of the Bible as "typically cranky" to give credence to "scholars" who argue the Bible considers gay and/or premarital sex perfectly kosher. In her February 6 post, "What the Bible Really Says About Sex," Miller noted that "[t]wo new books written by university scholars for a popular audience try to answer this question.":

On Thursday evening I noted news reports that the Fox entertainment network would not air an ad by a Christian website, LookUp316 -- referring of course to John 3:16 -- during Super Bowl XLV. So I was pleasantly surprised last night to find that Fox did air the ad after all, just before the beginning of the 4th quarter of the game. USA Today religion reporter Cathy Lynn Grossman was also…

Apparently the Fox entertainment network, which will broadcast Super Bowl XLV on Sunday, rejected an ad for LookUp316.com, as in the biblical verse John 3:16,  because it "[advances] particular beliefs or practices." [h/t Big Hollywood] However the ad itself -- see the embedded video below -- doesn't proselytize, it merely depicts a man watching a football game looking up "John 3:16" on his…

Can you imagine a Huffington Post headline entitled, "Secular Liberals Need to Understand the Role of Faith in American Politics"? Given the website's history of telling Christian conservative leaders to "go to Hell," celebrating the decline of Christianity in Great Britain, or trashing the Catholic Church, it's not very likely. But yesterday morning the Huffington Post ran a piece by the…

 After ABC’s World News ignored the March for Life pro-life event last week, the January 30 World News Sunday did find time to run a report highlighting complaints by gay rights activists over Chick-fil-A -- a family-owned restaurant chain known for its Christian-based social advocacy -- supplying food to a socially conservative group in Pennsylvania that promoted a ban on same-sex marriage in…

New York Times critic Michael Kimmelman was granted the front page of Wednesday’s Arts section for a snobbish chiding of uncouth American conservatives who helped squelch a video some found sacrilegious, by a featured artist in a Smithsonian gay art exhibit: “In Britain, Separation of Art and State.” ("Separation" except for when it comes to actually subsidizing the art, which Britain does…

It's not often that a CNN anchor declares America a "very Christian nation," but that's what new host Piers Morgan did on Thursday while debating atheist comedian Ricky Gervais. Morgan chided the entertainer for a joke he made while hosting last Sunday's Golden Globes. Morgan critiqued, "...I know American culture quite well now and they're a very Christian nation here in America." During…

Media outlets have uncritically trumpeted a story that claims a 1997 letter is a "smoking gun" that proves that Vatican officials warned Irish bishops not to report child abuse to civil authorities. In fact, as a cursory look at the letter reveals, it shows no such thing. This "smoking gun" story exhibits all the hallmarks of just another hit job by the media, so-called victims advocates, and…

"Holy Cross gets nod for new MoCo hospital: Women's advocates concerned." That's how the Washington Post's online "On Faith" feature teased a Metro section front-pager in the paper's January 21 print edition. [see screen capture below page break]

The Washington Post on Friday took on Seymour Hersh's outlandish conspiracy theory that "neo-conservative" members of Opus Dei and the Knights of Malta inside the military "overthrew the American government" and are waging a "crusade" against Muslims. The newspaper reported that, contrary to Hersh's claims, General Stanley McChrystal was not a member of either organization, and that there was "…

Liberal columnist Michael Kinsley made light of the Catholic Church's process of recognizing a saint in a Wednesday column for the Los Angeles Times, while simultaneously blasting the Church's opposition to embryonic stem cell research, claiming that the religion was a "main impediment" in developing a cure for Parkinson's disease.

Liberal journalist Seymour Hersh unleashed on President Obama in a speech in Qatar on Monday, voicing his extreme disappointment with his foreign policy: "Just when we needed an angry black man, we didn't get one." Hersh also revealed his Dan Brown-style conspiracy theory about how "neo-conservative radicals" in the military's special operations community "overthrew the American government…

To publicize his new memoir, MSNBC hosted Rev. Albert Cutie on its Friday afternoon news programming. Fr. Cutie is a married priest in the Episcopal Church, having abruptly left the Catholic priesthood in May of 2009 after his secret love affair was made public. Cutie used the segment to criticize the Catholic Church's position on priestly celibacy and homosexuality. "I can tell you that…

On Friday's CBS Early Show, correspondent Mark Phillips declared how the beatification of Pope John Paul II to sainthood was moving "at break-neck speed" and noted that "Groups protesting the Catholic Church's child abuse scandal are urging the Vatican to slow down the process." Despite the protests, Phillips remarked that "the current pope, Benedict XVI, seems determined to charge ahead…