Sightings Articles
To Pray or Not to Pray? Civil Religion and the 9/11 Memorial Service by Rick Elgendy
Last weekend, as the nation marked the tenth anniversary of the September 11 attacks, our collective media gaze focused on lower Manhattan, where the memorial service and dedication led by Mayor Michael Bloomberg had already provoked controversy. Tho...
September 15, 2011
Cretan Partisams
We Americans are not as smart as the ancient Cretans, at least in one very important respect. There were good reasons to ponder their example this weekend during the solemn observances of 9/11 after ten years. Ordinarily the mission of Sightings is t...
September 12, 2011
Contextualizing the Gülen Movement by Baqar Syed
A variety of fears have been expressed regarding "Gülen" charter schools in Texas, from possible financial irregularities to indoctrination of children in Islam. However, neither official state inquiries nor academic studies have found any evidence t...
September 8, 2011
American Culture and Old Order Anabaptism in the New Millennium by Adam Darlage
Jean Friedman-Rudovsky recently reported in Time magazine that between 2005 and 2009, 130 Mennonite women and girls on the Manitoba Colony near Santa Cruz, Bolivia, claimed that Peter Weiber, a Mennonite veterinarian, and eight other Mennonite men, s...
September 1, 2011
Ordinariate by Martin E. Marty
Hurricanes, earthquakes, droughts, famines, tsunamis, floods, volcanic eruptions, and many other natural disasters—supernatural disasters and signals to Glenn Beck and Pat Robertson—are prime global and local topics. They inspire prayer and practical...
August 29, 2011
Religious Origins of America's Interventions by James K. Wellman, Jr. and S. R. Thompson
America’s foreign interventions over the last century arise from deeply held religious motivations. The source of these motivations reaches back to the end of the nineteenth century, and the invention of the “social gospel.” A gospel that would redee...
August 25, 2011
Hell Reappeared -- Martin E. Marty
It’s bad journalism to obsess about a topic and inflict it on readers; it’s bad manners for a columnist to be self-referential. So I’ll start off saying “my bad!” and “my bad!” for returning to last week’s topic, “Hell.” And some readers may fear tha...
August 22, 2011
Religion and Taxes by Alexander E. Sharp
The deficit and budget battles in Washington make clear that the divisions between us are deep, even spiritual. The fight is not over the size of the deficit, nor even about expenditure cuts. It is about taxes as the lifeblood of government. Why a...
August 18, 2011
Who Wins? Two Books about Heaven and Hell by Martin E. Marty
“Let’s you and him fight!” The old comic-book trope is good advice for bystanders as Mark Galli’s God Wins counters Rob Bell and his book Love Wins. The two are respected evangelical leaders, an editor and a pastor, who attract headlines and readersh...
August 15, 2011
Revolution before Politics in Egypt by David Faris
On July 8 activist groups and parties in Egypt began a weeks-long sit-in, re-occupying Tahrir Square, seeking justice for those killed in the revolution, and pushing for swifter prosecution of officials from the deposed regime of Hosni Mubarak. After...