The military is optimizing religious diversity for military priorities and are making chaplaincies an integral part of its efforts to maintain “full-spectrum dominance,” writes Ed Waggoner (Brite Divinity School, Fort Worth, TX) in the Journal of the American Academy of Religion (September). While military chaplaincies have a long history and are seen as being of […]
Church choirs decline, shift toward more participatory mode
In some sectors of American Christianity, choirs are on the downturn, yet this musical form is adapting itself to the new religious landscape, writes Cathy Lynn Grossman in a Religion News Service-based article in the Washington Post (Sept. 17). Citing the recently released National Congregations Study, Grossman reports that choirs are on the downturn especially […]
Christian Scientists’ ecumenical involvement brings changes to faith
Christian Scientists are forging new links with other Christians in such areas as prayer and fellowship since their church has engaged in ecumenical dialogues, according to the current issue of the Journal of Ecumenical Studies (Spring). The Christian Science Church began a series of informal dialogues with the National Council of Churches about five years […]
Younger Muslims press for changing of the guard in American Islamic activism, advocacy
The rising generation of American Muslim leaders are taking a more assertive stance in activism and advocacy on civil rights issues, according to a report by the Middle Eastern news service Al Jazeera (July 24). The recent “iftar” or annual consultation between U.S. Muslim leaders and President Obama met with a wave of criticism from […]
Keeping food halal and aiming for non-Muslim market
Just as kosher food found a following beyond its Jewish market, Islamic halal products are seeking to reach non-Muslim mainstream American consumers, according to two reports. The New York Times (June 13) reports on the successful efforts of Adnan A. Durrani to market his Saffron Road halal frozen food entries to the popular store chain […]
Conservative Christians rallying to charter school movement
Support for charter schools has often been viewed in largely pragmatic terms, but the movement to establish this popular alternative to public schools has had significant religious and particularly evangelical involvement and interest, according to a study in Social Science Quarterly (June). Author Andrea Vieux writes that conventional wisdom suggests religious conservatives would most likely […]
The Mormon dilemma—burgeoning missionaries and saturated mission fields
Missions are flourishing in Mormonism in the year-and-a-half since the church lowered the minimum age for full-time missionary service, but it might not be helping to jumpstart the slow growth the church is experiencing, according to the Salt Lake Tribune (April 26). The faith has seen its proselytizing force grow from 58,500 to more than […]
Jews across denominational spectrum taking up the Montessori method for day schools
Claiming that the traditional Jewish day school model they grew up with is “outmoded and too clannish for 21st century Judaism, a new generation of parents and educators are flocking to Montessori preschools and elementary schools that combine secular studies with Torah and Hebrew lessons,” reports the New York Times (Feb. 21). The Montessori method […]
Seminaries and church-related universities getting back together
Declining enrollments in Protestant and Catholic seminaries are forcing some schools into new relationships. In some cases, it includes mergers with colleges and universities, reviving an educational model that was more common in earlier centuries, reports Forum Letter (January), an independent Lutheran newsletter. In the new model, seminaries are coming under the university’s umbrella as […]
Copts at home and in US at odds on Islam, religious freedom
The growing numbers of Coptic Orthodox Christians in the U.S. and the ongoing pressures against their faith in Egypt has strengthened a brand of activism stressing anti-Islamic polemics, according to Yvonne Haddad and Joshua Donovan writing in the journal Studies in World Christianity (No. 3, 2013). They write that “Coptic organizations in diaspora see themselves […]