Sightings Articles
Decline in the Megachurches by Martin E. Marty
Schadenfreude, or rejoicing in others’ misfortunes, is abundantly evident in responses, blogged and otherwise, to the bad/sad news about the decline of the famed Crystal Cathedral, a megachurch founded in the mid-1950s in California. Publicity has b...
June 7, 2010
The Faith-based Initiative and Congregational Change by Martin E. Marty
“Did the Faith-based Initiative Change Congregations?” asked astute sociologists of religion Bob Wineberg and Mark Chaves last April. The answer: No. Chaves, based at Duke University, follows up with a revision in The Christian Century (June 1), “...
May 31, 2010
Supply and Demand of Professional Ministers by Martin E. Marty
Public prayer, the kind Americans fight over a good deal, was not on the favorite “to-do” list of the Jesus of the Gospels. Just the opposite. He is heard saying: Don’t call attention to your praying in public. Go home and shut the door. Public ...
May 24, 2010
Martyrdom by Martin E. Marty
Almost always Sightings takes off from a current text or image lifted from news and opinion sources. This week our “current” text is 1900 years old. It happened that Sunday I was to engage in a moonlighting vocation, namely preaching a sermon, some...
May 17, 2010
Cuts in the Humanities
“Why Cuts in Humanities Teaching Pose a Threat to Democracy Itself” is the subhead for an article titled “Skills for Life” in the April 30th Times Literary Supplement, authored by the University of Chicago’s (and the world’s) Martha Nussbaum. Such h...
May 10, 2010
The Mojave Cross: Religious or Not? by Martin E. Marty
Days ago, the Supreme Court’s currently-standard 5-4 majority ruled that “the Mojave Cross,” a contested war memorial in the desert of California, may stand. The case itself is too complicated – it involved lower court rulings on a land transfer, an...
May 3, 2010
Israel's Holy War by Martin E. Marty
In eleven years of weekly Sightings I can’t find that I ever commented on “public religion” in Israel. The U. S. is usually in our sights, and we are aware of participation in or leadership of holy wars by Hindu militants, Muslim extremists, Buddhis...
April 26, 2010
Protestants and the Supreme Court by Martin E. Marty
Score-keepers readying themselves for the forthcoming summer’s Armageddon-level Senate debates over the next Supreme Court appointment find plenty of skirmishing at the line of scrimmage before the first ball is snapped. One of the points of controv...
April 19, 2010
Media New and Old by Martin E. Marty
Every ten years a Religion Communication Congress meets, as it did last weekend in Chicago. I attended, as is my decennial habit. Though I could not stay to the end, I did get to chair a panel on “How Social Change is Changing Media Coverage of Rel...
April 12, 2010
Abundance and Choice by Martin E. Marty
“Easter Monday,” Christian clergy call today. Rabbis probably have an analogous term for their well-earned day or week or fortnight off following holiday holiday ceremonies. After too much heavy, even sometimes traumatic, religion news, let’s use t...