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Peter Manseau’s first novel, Songs for the Butcher’s Daughter, takes on themes of Jewish-Christian enmity, the trials of translation, and the idea of language as a virtual homeland.

Though Mumbai militants were instructed to kill “Jews who were Israelis,” few of the victims had any ties to Israel and at least one was an Ultra-Orthodox anti-Zionist. Comprehending the conflicting notions of Jewishness is essential to understanding whether this was an act of anti-Semitism or not.

Pulitzer Prize-winner Marilynne Robinson’s third novel in as many decades is packed with the author’s signature themes of struggle, torment, grace, mystery and vulnerability-in other words: Christianity. Indeed, only a Christian of uncommon mettle could write a novel so untainted by the bastardized tropes of Christian culture.

A radical queer group claims to have burned a “Mormon Bible,” vandalized churches, and urges supporters to fight back “by any means necessary.” Ariana Childs Graham asks: Is this activism or just a really bad idea?

RD News Round-Up—December 15, 2008: Bush’s Faith-Based Initiative after 8 years; ‘War on Christmas’ mash-up; Religious Right layoffs and cutbacks, ‘Prop. 8—The Musical,’ Prop. 8 Gear, and the first Vietnamese American elected to Congress.

Prop. 8 opponents frame the struggle in the context of the larger civil rights movement. But what if the right to marry for LGBT people is actually a question of religious freedom?

A young Iraqi woman, frustrated and in tears, explains to her classmates: “If Iraqi people come at you with shoes, you have lost their hearts and lost the war and God help us all.”

Newsweek actually gets religion, writes the author of the recent gay marriage issue. It’s the Christian Right culture warriors who claim that God possesses their prejudices who are mistaken.

Forget the standard litany of the best-selling books and most popular movies… This year’s list includes comics, rock bands, Battlestar Galactica, “Hava Nagila” sung to the tune of “The Twist,” and “I Am the Walrus” translated into Aramaic.

A major newsmagazine gets theological, and infuriates conservatives. But the Newsweek story doesn’t even scratch the surface of contemporary religion scholarship on gay marriage.