https://politicalresearch.org/ The latest research related to islam en https://religiondispatches.org/2024/04/03/whats-matter-joe-biden-disgust-builds-over-calamity-gaza-president-offers-only-toothless Lately I’ve been wondering if Joe Biden is an Islamophobe. I don’t use the word lightly: Ordinarily I prefer we seek out aspirations and commitments that might inspire us towards shared goals. But how else can I make sense of… Wed, 03 Apr 2024 03:42:48 EDT Haroon Moghul 46163f73-2b8d-4fd3-b6d7-301a89fe8884 https://religiondispatches.org/2023/08/03/contrary-claims-anti-trans-muslims-lgbtq-acceptance-widespread-history-islam In recent weeks, school boards across the country have become sites of conflict as organized anti-trans and anti-gay protests allied with calls for book bans to target actual and perceived LGBTQ+ content in education. They’ve been joined, in some cases… Thu, 03 Aug 2023 02:46:45 EDT Ali Olomi 13c291a9-1f66-4830-b90b-6a17cc750bc2 https://religiondispatches.org/2023/02/06/jokes-chatgpt-chooses-which-religious-traditions-and-figures-deserve-respect-and ChatGPT is all the rage. It even drives some people into a rage. It does some remarkable things, it does some outrageous things, it does some absurd things. Most things it does badly, such as tell you how to build… Mon, 06 Feb 2023 12:28:42 EST Robert M. Geraci 1855ed91-1864-4e29-9194-89b56ce07424 https://religiondispatches.org/2023/01/13/religious-studies-professor-i-disagreed-hamline-firing-now-ive-changed-my-mind Since learning about Hamline University’s recent firing of an instructor, the flurry of thoughts and feelings I’ve had resembles the inside of a snow globe. Readers probably know the story by now. Erika López Prater, an adjunct instructor of art… Fri, 13 Jan 2023 04:22:54 EST Kate Blanchard c6897d28-f77d-44b9-81f5-83793e165901 https://religiondispatches.org/2022/08/17/vile-attack-salman-rushdie-reminds-us-value-free-society-our-outrage-more-about-criminal When it was published in 1988, The Satanic Verses wasn’t immediately controversial. But the charged politics of Islam and the West meant some kind of blowback to Salman Rushdie’s novel was likely: The Iran-Iraq War had just ended and the… Wed, 17 Aug 2022 01:15:54 EDT Haroon Moghul a3220164-ceaa-464c-8e5e-ee6406b154ca https://religiondispatches.org/2022/05/26/what-hell-wrong-us-muslim-response-americas-failure-change More times than I can remember, I’ve had to ascend the minbar and address a Friday congregation reeling. Many Imams will do the same painful work this week. But for many American Muslims, Buffalo and Uvalde strike in other ways… Thu, 26 May 2022 05:38:32 EDT Haroon Moghul b45b46ea-2b23-403e-a826-850f61cf9b65 https://religiondispatches.org/2021/05/18/are-we-seeing-end-good-arabs-israel For anyone who follows the conflict in Israel/Palestine, the latest conflagration seems all too familiar. Tensions rise in the West Bank, in this case around the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem where the government is considering evicting Arab residents… Tue, 18 May 2021 11:57:23 EDT Shaul Magid 1e750c78-c13c-4cdb-8a85-8795a1270dfc https://religiondispatches.org/2020/12/15/forced-cremation-covid-dead-sri-lanka-further-marginalizes-muslim-community Baby Shaayiq Faz was just 20 days old when he died. He was the youngest Covid victim in Sri Lanka, born amid a pandemic and cremated before reaching his first birthday. Officials at a Sri Lankan hospital claim the baby… Tue, 15 Dec 2020 01:24:51 EST Andrea Malji, Amarnath Amarasingam 448f1b4a-05ed-427d-8da4-72ea72521459 https://religiondispatches.org/2020/08/08/satanic-temples-satanic-abortion-ritual-may-challenge-states-anti-abortion-laws Last week, The Satanic Temple (TST) introduced “the Satanic Abortion Ritual”—a ritual designed to provide religious support and comfort for women who’ve decided to get an abortion. But the ritual has legal consequences as well as spiritual ones: TST claims… Sat, 08 Aug 2020 02:08:45 EDT Joseph Laycock e5893760-7651-43fb-9ab7-08834f2edc65 https://religiondispatches.org/2020/05/20/asceticism-la-carte-fasting-ramadan-muslim-atheist Ever since becoming an atheist many years ago, I’ve discarded most everything having to do with Islam. I don’t perform the daily prayers, I don’t attend my local mosque, and I don’t believe that God exists. In my view, the… Wed, 20 May 2020 12:41:51 EDT Saif Ansari 034ea619-7c14-4223-919b-d4b38cc0881a https://religiondispatches.org/2020/04/30/churchgoers-stay-home-its-american-way Across the nation, stay-at-home orders have quieted downtowns, schools, theaters, and stadiums. But one kind of gathering space—the house of worship—has proven especially contested ground. Directives to suspend religious meetings have met with both resignation and protest. Suggestions to live-stream… Thu, 30 Apr 2020 03:17:23 EDT Shelby Balik b6b11e85-8c38-424b-bb9a-9a0e209a4669 https://religiondispatches.org/2020/04/24/civil-religion-v-uncivil-religion-deadly-consequences Readers will know that we at Religion Dispatches hold no special brief for faith or no faith, or any particular brand of religion. We have invested many years and much of ourselves, dear God so much of ourselves, into a… Fri, 24 Apr 2020 01:56:30 EDT Daniel Schultz a3881fb3-5d40-424b-9995-f6173922dcb1 https://religiondispatches.org/2018/05/18/2016-was-year-queer-and-trans-muslims-entered-public-consciousness-mahdia-lynn-new-era The following is an exclusive excerpt from Kaleidoscope , a podcast featuring conversations on religion with the people often left out of conversations on religion and politics hosted by Deborah Jian Lee . As each new episode is released, Religion… Fri, 18 May 2018 01:12:46 EDT The Editors 0e7eb642-4923-4ca4-b677-54236b1c75b4 https://religiondispatches.org/2017/12/18/indonesian-court-rejects-religious-conservatives-bid-criminalize-gay-sex-more-global Costa Rican human rights and anti-torture activist Victor Madrigal-Borloz is the new UN Independent Expert on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity. The first expert, Vitit Muntarbhorn, resigned for health reasons after his first year in the position, which was created… Mon, 18 Dec 2017 12:04:57 EST Peter Montgomery 8d3b4277-3328-49cd-8e55-6790a23489ec https://religiondispatches.org/2017/11/27/leave-your-stereotypes-door-10q-keeping-it-halal What inspired you to write Keeping It Halal: The Everyday Lives of Muslim American Teenage Boys ? I am a Muslim convert. I was raised Catholic and converted to Islam in 2003. Three years later, I began a graduate program… Mon, 27 Nov 2017 10:18:25 EST John O'Brien a915fd8c-f673-410c-86b9-8d76044c8e74 https://religiondispatches.org/2017/11/13/occultism-and-new-age-take-iran-interview-alireza-doostdar RD: What inspired you to write The Iranian Metaphysicals: Explorations in Science, Islam, and the Uncanny? My book is about occultism and spiritual experimentation in modern Iran, and I examine these in terms of attempts to achieve rational, scientific understandings… Mon, 13 Nov 2017 03:18:25 EST Alireza Doostdar 538b98a1-08c4-48cb-8303-399648725daa https://religiondispatches.org/2017/09/05/catholic-cardinal-slams-jesuits-bridge-building-book-and-more-global-lgbt-recap Reports from several international LGBT gatherings: The Interfaith Diversity Network of West Africa (IDNOWA), founded in 2016, reported on its August gathering in Accra, Ghana, which drew more than 30 delegates from 10 countries, for interfaith worship and conversations about… Tue, 05 Sep 2017 11:26:44 EDT Peter Montgomery de0731a2-d5ea-4f4c-b711-320073d2610a https://religiondispatches.org/2017/08/14/challenging-both-homophobia-islam-and-populist-bogeyman-homophobic-muslim-and-more Taken together, several articles published this week challenge populist portrayals of the “homophobic Muslim” as a threat to Western values in various countries, while also challenging conservative Muslim teachings that queerness and Islam are incompatible. In the Guardian, Moustafa Bayoumi… Mon, 14 Aug 2017 10:00:10 EDT Peter Montgomery 6d519c21-6dba-43bb-a073-260ecc864c3d https://religiondispatches.org/2017/06/26/turkish-police-move-against-activists-who-defied-pride-ban-and-more-global-lgbt-recap The anti-equality World Congress of Families will hold its fourth Caribbean regional summit on June 29 and 30 in St. John’s Antigua, with speakers from US Religious Right groups Focus on the Family and Family Watch International joining Caribbean-based leaders… Mon, 26 Jun 2017 12:50:22 EDT Peter Montgomery 8915c6f2-8b30-4212-a396-080f242237f6 https://religiondispatches.org/2017/06/21/religion-episode-aziz-ansari-and-cultural-politics-muslim-self-representation To call Aziz Ansari’s Netflix series Master of None “peak TV” is not to do it justice. It has a lightness to it that makes it a relief from the overwrought self-importance of shows that define the medium for the… Wed, 21 Jun 2017 06:30:22 EDT Timothy Gutmann 4e3237f5-80e8-4a6b-a67a-ac66fb49a6c7 https://religiondispatches.org/2017/06/15/new-study-islamophobia-common-catholic-media With Catholic commentators writing about the “threat” of Islam, it’s no surprise many U.S. Catholics have negative views of Muslims Thu, 15 Jun 2017 03:28:40 EDT Jordan Denari Duffner aa6662ab-4219-4bfa-97c4-cee395a5ed86 https://religiondispatches.org/2017/06/12/scottish-episcopal-church-angers-conservative-anglicans-embrace-same-sex-marriage-and The Global Interfaith Network on Sex, Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Expression has published an e-book, “ Behold, I make all things new: What do the sacred texts of Judaism, Christianity and Islam really say in regard to human sexuality?”… Mon, 12 Jun 2017 12:32:18 EDT Peter Montgomery 2af81c60-a424-45b3-b09d-693967619a7c https://religiondispatches.org/2017/06/08/no-cnn-saudi-arabia-and-iran-have-not-been-fighting-1000-years Yesterday, after the ISIS attack on Teheran, this astonishing paragraph appeared in a CNN article: Now, it is true that Saudi Arabia and Iran “have had strained relations,” but these strained relations go back not 1,000 years, but to the… Thu, 08 Jun 2017 12:31:47 EDT Haroon Moghul 93febf19-1b59-4097-a7d4-d895cabe33b8 https://religiondispatches.org/2017/05/29/world-congress-families-draws-anti-lgbt-activists-budapest-more-global-lgbt-recap Activists from around the world celebrated the International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (IDAHOT). The Arab Foundation for Freedoms and Equality compiled 14 IDAHOT projects from the Middle East and North Africa region. The World Congress of Families, a global… Mon, 29 May 2017 07:00:59 EDT Peter Montgomery 5533e1ff-e036-4223-8692-67da160d004a https://religiondispatches.org/2017/05/24/manchester-last-gasp-failing-terror-movement The suicide attack by Salman Abedi outside the Manchester arena that killed 22 young people out on a fun evening on the town was claimed by ISIS. On the other hand, the terrorist movement of the Islamic State of Iraq… Wed, 24 May 2017 04:25:09 EDT Mark Juergensmeyer 2770712a-d29a-4c62-bfc0-ad4396e80643