Picture by Jez Timms on Unsplash. Meatless Fridays were once one of the most visible markers of Catholic identity. For most of the American faithful, they are now observed only in the special liturgical season of Lent. US bishops should impose it as a weekly matter once again. The pastoral hopes that caused them to…
Southern Baptist Church by Warren LeMay (CC0 1.0) In May of 2022, the news broke that the US Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) had released an independent report investigating the SBC’s handling of sexual harassment and assault by clergy and other employees of SBC-affiliated churches. The report described an institution that prioritized avoiding liability, was callous…
This article is part of our “Kennedy, Carson, and Dobbs: Law and Religion in Pressing Supreme Court Cases” series.If you’d like to check out other articles in this series, click here. 2021-2022 was a blockbuster Supreme Court term for opponents of church-state separation. In the course of a few short months, the Court stripped women of…
body of water under cloudy sky during sunset by Storiès on Unsplash. Conflict and Religion Is religion a conflict dimension in today’s Ethiopia? Does it have an impact on the ongoing armed confrontations in the country? Some observers think so, but I disagree. Ethiopia, the second-most populated country in Africa, with approximately 112 million people,…
silhouette of trees covered by fog by Paul Pastourmatzis on Unsplash. The United States Constitution, drafted in 1787, is a remarkable document. It is the oldest written and operating constitution in the world. There have been twenty-seven amendments to this text since its inception, from the original Bill of Rights, inclusive of the first ten…
This essay is adapted from Prof. Rafael Domingo’s address at the ICLARS (International Consortium for Law and Religion Studies) conference in Cordoba, Spain, on Sept. 19 2022. 1. Introduction Joseph E. David and John Witte, Jr. have both written books that deserve particular attention because of these two scholars’ massive contribution to the field of…
Bible, Church, Wedding (Pixabay) In the course of calling out anti-Semitism in American law – a very valid concern – Dr. Mia Brett’s recent Canopy Forum article argues that “Christian religious belief is the justification for many civil rights challenges we are seeing now.” Among them? Efforts to ban abortion, which “rest…on Christian religion.” Although legal justifications for prohibiting abortion “might pretend to have…
Yonghe Baofu Temple in Taipei, Taiwan by Andrea De Santis on Unsplash. One of the most notable characteristics of Taiwan’s approach to regulating religion is that the country has very few laws that directly intervene in religious affairs. Though some other Asian countries have religion-specific statutes that restrict interfaith marriage, regulate proselytization, or criminalize certain…
Picture by Mostafa Meraji (CC BY-SA 4.0) Contemporary efforts to regulate religious schools are unjust and bound to fail. Emerging legislation in Australia and the ongoing judicial controversy in the United States over the freedom of officials in faith-based schools to hire staff and admit students who share their values present serious challenges to educators in…
Picture by Pawal Czerwinski on Unsplash. Post-colonial Middle Eastern states have failed to achieve national secularization and homogenisation. Nation-building has been obstructed by prevalent transnational communal affiliations. In Lebanon, a power-sharing consociational arrangement preserved the autonomy of sectarian groups in a loose national union. A communitocracy is formed to protect group plurality against forced national…