Sightings Articles
Printed Matters -- Martin E. Marty
Sightings's publisher, editor, and this writer, along with much of the rest of America, recently left their desks for a couple of weeks, which is the equivalent of our wearing sleep masks and doing no sighting. And like so many others, we packed off ...
August 8, 2005
Radical Islam in Europe -- Martin E. Marty
The Islamic Center in Munich, started by ex-Nazis, is now the base of radical Islam in Germany. Tens of thousands of Muslims in the Soviet Army switched sides to fight for Hitler. They stayed to build up a community influenced by the fundamentalist M...
July 18, 2005
The Decline of Military Chaplaincy -- Martin E. Marty
Sighting military chaplains these days demands strong binoculars -- chaplains are distant and few -- as well as measures of attention that most citizens lack. But to focus in on a sample: Forward offers a cover story called "Military Services Hit Har...
July 11, 2005
Rossing's Rapture -- Martin E. Marty
When I use the word "literally," I mean "literally" -- not metaphorically, as in "it was literally raining cats and dogs." Literally, one or two-score pages of the newspapers that came my way last week bannered the place of religion in American life ...
July 5, 2005
Reporting on Billy Graham -- Martin E. Marty
My notes from a quick trip to New York to cover Billy Graham: "The attention shown by the full house last night was a tribute to his organization and to his appeal. Authority and sincerity more than color and emotionalism contribute to that appeal...
June 27, 2005
Evangelical Ecologies -- Martin E. Marty
Pro-war, pro-gun, pro-executions, anti-pro-choice, pro-DeLay, pro-public school prayer, pro-Frist, pro-Schindler, pro-apocalypse, pro-Robertson/Falwell/Dobson/LaHaye: you could look it up! -- these are the only things most mass communicators communic...
June 20, 2005
American Culture, American Religion -- Martin E. Marty
Given the global decline in America's reputation in recent years and bemusement, at least among Europeans, over the public religiosity of the U.S., the press runs many stories on "how others see us." Now and then we find a piece that we might call "h...
June 13, 2005
Borderline Behaviors -- Martin E. Marty
WWJD -- "What would Jesus do?" -- remember that faddish acronym? WWJD recently returned with an appearance in commentator Bill O'Reilly's syndicated column. He used it a) to show that he "knew" what Jesus would do to fight off illegal immigrants, and...
June 6, 2005
Paean to Pipe Organs -- Martin E. Marty
Call this column "Hearings" this week, since it deals with something auditory, namely pipe organs. Pipe organs as a topic, when there is so much that is urgent in the religion-and-politics world? Yes. I keep in mind the Hans Kuitert book title Everyt...
May 30, 2005
Entertaining Religion -- Martin E. Marty
"The United States is a secular society." "Elites don't give religion a break." "Hollywood ignores the spiritual and the religious." Whether you hear such lines as truisms, myths, clichés, charges, distractions, or delusions, you certainly will hear ...