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Shopping is an ethical act. Today we live in a culture of cheap. We have an unprecedented access to cheap goods, yet we must recognize that cheap goods are cheaply made. I am not speaking of quality, I am speaking of cheap labor. We must recognize that through the act of shopping—whether it is for an article of clothing, a toy, a pint of strawberries, or even our morning cup of coffee—we participate in a global economy that values profit over people. Disposable goods are made by disposable people, faceless individuals whose backbreaking and unjustly paid labor produce the goods we consume. What we buy and where we buy it is a political act. It is also, I argue, a religious act.

What’s the importance of the status of Jerusalem for the Alaskan contender?

Just about all of the issues that we religious folk insist we really care about—issues like world poverty and hunger, resource wars and environmental degradation, human trafficking, widening domestic inequality, shrinking access to quality higher education, declining on-time graduation rates for low-income students and students of color, urban neighborhood blight, stress-related health problems, declining family life and domestic violence—are directly related to systemic debt oppression.

On December 9, residents of Glastonbury, England discovered a gruesome crime scene. Vandals had dismembered the Holy Thorn Tree that sits atop Wearyall Hill. But why would someone do a thing like that?

Family Research Council spearheads a pushback campaign against the Southern Poverty Law Center’s controversial “hate group” designation.

Cardinal John Henry Newman, England’s most famous convert to Roman Catholicism, is on his way to sainthood. Is this why the Vatican is preparing to move his grave and separate him from the friend he requested to be buried with?

It doesn’t take much to realize the main theme of A Fire in my Belly is death. More specifically, it is the vulnerability, penetrability, and perpetually possible disintegration of the human body. This fleshly mortality became especially real to Wojnarowicz in the still emerging AIDS crisis of the time. Thus, by necessity it is a deeply human and deeply religious artwork. Which does not mean these images are pleasant and easy to look at. No warm and fuzzy pop spirituality this.

On Monday, in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, the Supreme Court relied heavily on “less restrictive alternatives” when it exempted closely-held corporations from the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive…

I call this M & M because afterwards it may not be possible to keep up with all the names of places that start with an M: Makkah, Madinah, Muzdalifah, and Mina.

The Orthodox Jewish community in the U.S. has treated allegations of sexual abuse with the same secrecy and refusal to include secular authorities as the Catholic Church. Now, however, more Orthodox abuse victims are coming forward than ever before.