A president’s first Thanksgiving Day proclamation is an opportunity for the commander in chief to highlight his new administration’s accomplishments or reassure the nation at a time of gratitude and family togetherness. But President Obama’s Turkey Day bulletin Monday went in a different direction. Obama’s declaration is short — just over 400 words — and... Continue Reading

Even for a religion started by a science fiction writer, the allegations levelled against the Church of Scientology in Australia’s federal parliament last week sound stranger than fiction. Blackmail, cover-ups of child abuse, labour camps, embezzlement and coerced abortions are spelled out among the 53 pages of allegations by seven former Scientologists – some of... Continue Reading

A month of harsh words between Rep. Patrick Kennedy and a strident critic, Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas Tobin, escalated recently when the bishop acknowledged asking Kennedy not to receive Holy Communion because of the Democratic lawmaker’s support for abortion rights. The bishop’s attempt to publicly shame Kennedy on his abortion stance comes just a few... Continue Reading

Nashville’s Thomas Nelson Inc., the nation’s largest Christian publishing company, has filed a lawsuit against one of its major competitors, claiming that the rival publisher conspired with a freelance artist to copy the illustrations for one of Thomas Nelson’s newest Christian series for children. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Nashville, seeks unspecified... Continue Reading

For years, Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri criticized Iran’s supreme leader and argued that the country was not the Islamic democracy it claimed to be, but his words seemed to fall on deaf ears. Now many Iranians, including some former government leaders, are listening. Ayatollah Montazeri has emerged as the spiritual leader of the opposition,... Continue Reading

The United States Supreme Court has refused to hear the case of a high school valedictorian whose microphone was turned off by school officials after she began speaking about the part her Christian beliefs played in her success in life. Attorneys for The Rutherford Institute had asked the Court to hear the case of Brittany... Continue Reading

The former editorial page editor of the Washington Times has filed a discrimination complaint against the paper, saying he was “coerced” into attending a Unification Church religious ceremony that culminated in a mass wedding conducted by the church’s leader, the Rev. Sun Myung Moon. Richard Miniter, who was also vice president of opinion, made the... Continue Reading

They are calling it the Manhattan Declaration, a 4,700 word manifesto reaching into scripture and signed by 148 Orthodox, Catholic and evangelical leaders. It was released this afternoonNovember 20 at a press conference in Washington D.C. and is designed to draw a line in the sand across three issues they argue are non-negotiable despite the... Continue Reading

A friend’s Facebook link took me to a CNN article that I thought would infuriate me. The headline was “McDonnell won’t disavow Robertson’s Islam remarks.” What CNN failed to articulate was, to my surprise, that Virginia Governor-elect McDonnell sounded more Madisonian than Robertsonian. You’ll recall that in response to Nidal Hasan’s shooting rampage at Ft.... Continue Reading

By the time the “sweet pudding of native corn” makes its appearance, delivered by period-costumed servers in brightly colored, flowing wool skirts and breeches, there could be little doubt as to how a 17th-century Pilgrim banquet, commonly known as a “groaning board,” got its name. Preceding it was a sallet (salad), mussels, sauc’d turkey, and... Continue Reading