Sightings Articles
The Role of Religion in the Growth of Democracy in Germany
Over the next few weeks, Germany will celebrate the 25th anniversary of the peaceful revolution that re-unified the nation’s western and eastern halves and transformed the former Soviet-bloc German Democratic Republic into a free and democratic socie...
October 30, 2014
Southern White Evangelical Decline -- Martin E. Marty
Southern Evangelicals Dwindling—and Take the GOP Edge With Them ...
October 27, 2014
Religion Unites and Divides -- Martin E. Marty
“ISIS CRISIS.” . . . “EBOLA CRISIS” . . . “ECONOMIC WORRIES” . . . Headlines about these and others point to realities which often have religious dimensions. One of them is posed in a featured interview with Jodi Picoult, the novelist author of Leavi...
October 20, 2014
Irony as the Form of Wisdom, and Its Limit -- W. Clark Gilpin
Irony is one of the principal forms of wisdom, as wisdom has been understood in world philosophical and spiritual traditions. Among the contributions of irony to wisdom traditions, perhaps the most important has been its counsel of humility with re...
October 16, 2014
Plastic Religious Art: Playful to Some, Offensive to Others
What better tactic for grabbing headlines than to crucify a Ken doll?...
October 9, 2014
How Not To Understand ISIS -- Alireza Doostdar
The group known as the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant or simply the Islamic State (ISIL, ISIS, or IS) has attracted much attention in the past few months with its dramatic military gains in Syria and Iraq and with the recent U.S. decision to wa...
October 2, 2014
Pseudo-Events Clash -- Martin E. Marty
On the border between events and pseudo-events....