The Trump administration is promoting new proposed rules on social service partnerships with faith-based organizations under the banner of religious freedom. A closer look, however, reveals that the proposals would actually eliminate certain religious liberty protections for social service beneficiaries, and that none of the Trump administration’s justifications for its actions holds water. To appreciate…
Abstract by mahtabahamad on Flickr (CC0) This is the second of a three-part series of essays that discuss the Jewish tradition’s answer to repairing the soul in the midst of wrongdoing, guilt, and shame. The first part used the biblical story of King David to illustrate the importance of taking ownership of one’s wrongdoing, though…
Abstract by mahtabahamad on Flickr (CCO) This is the first of a three-part series of essays that discuss the Jewish tradition’s answer to repairing the soul in the midst of wrongdoing, guilt, and shame. This first part uses the biblical story of King David to illustrate the importance of taking ownership of one’s wrongdoing; guilt…
Source: NIAID-RML/ Flickr CC.BY.2.0 This article is part of our “Reflecting on COVID-19” series.If you’d like to check out other articles in this series, click here. The author is a practicing surgeon who volunteered early in the pandemic to staff an expansion intensive care unit at a hospital in the northeast United States. The following…
Interior Photography of Church created by freestocks.org (Pexels, CC) Over the last few years, I have attempted to present a universal and coherent legal framework for the treatment of God, religion, and conscience by secular legal systems. This project is based on my objections to both traditional religious and current liberal approaches to religious freedom.…
“Blossoming of Magnolia Flowers in Spring Time” by Kaboompics.com on Pexels (CCO) In Israeli society, Haredim (ultra-Orthodox Jews) and traditional Arabs live within close proximity to one another. While these religiously, ethnically, and culturally differentiated groups do not typically interact with each other, women from both groups appear to share certain aspects of their lifestyles.…
Vijay Vinoth / Pexels In 2019 in early September, the Ethiopian government held an emergency meeting with leaders of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church to discuss the ongoing political and religious tension in the country. Since July 2018, thirty churches have been attacked across several regions in Ethiopia. More than half of those churches have burned to the…
Pixabay (License) This article is part of our “Reflecting on COVID-19” series.If you’d like to check out other articles in this series, click here. As the holiday of Passover approaches, we think of the last days of the Jews in Egypt. We think of Pharaoh faced with a slave-insurrection and a series of plagues that ravage his…
Image by Jpatokal, CC BY-SA 3.0 On a global level, religious institutions influence the transformations of law in a variety of ways. Many of the world’s most influential religions, such as Judaism, Islam, and Hinduism, contain their own legal systems that interact with secular state law. In addition to these larger systems that drive religious legal change, individuals…
B. K. Dewey / Creative Commons CC BY-NC 2.0 One of the most striking trends in religion clause jurisprudence is the expansion of protection for religious exercise. This includes expanded protection under the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) and its state counterparts. Often the litigant is a conservative Christian opposed to a progressive development,…