Monthly Archives: September 2005

Giant Jesus: Highway Guardian or Christian Kitsch?

By RNS Blog Editor — September 24, 2005

c. 2005 Religion News Service MIDDLETOWN, Ohio _ Shake every kudzu vine across America’s southern Bible belt, and no glow-in-the-dark plastic Jesus quite like Ohio’s mega-messiah will ever pop out. Nicknamed “Super Savior,” the 62-foot-tall statue of Christ looms over land reclaimed from a cornfield. It dominates a once-deadly stretch of Interstate 75 in southwestern […]

COMMENTARY: Removing `God’ from Pledge Won’t Harm Faith

By RNS Blog Editor — September 24, 2005

c. 2005 Religion News Service (UNDATED) Once again, we’re arguing over whether we should keep God out of our public schools. As if we could. I don’t think God takes marching orders from us. So I do not share the anxiety of those who claim that a U.S. federal judge’s recent order to remove the […]

Praying before the big game

By Tracy Gordon — September 23, 2005

Quote of the Day: Fellowship of Christian Athletes Executive Dan Britton “The landscape of sports is so crazy-parents beating up coaches, NBA players going into the stands, baseball players getting traded halfway through the season. A wooden bat and a leather ball make a horrible god. We say, let’s go to the Bible.” -Dan Britton, […]

Vatican Rules Would Try to Prevent Gays From Entering Priesthood

By RNS Blog Editor — September 23, 2005

c. 2005 Religion New Service VATICAN CITY _ New rules that would bar gay men from the Roman Catholic priesthood have been submitted to Pope Benedict XVI for approval, signaling a push for tightened regulations as the church prepares to review the sexual conduct of its seminarians. Prepared by the Vatican’s Congregation for Catholic Education, […]

Iraqi Fights for Democracy, Religious Tolerance, Despite Murder of Sons

By RNS Blog Editor — September 23, 2005

c. 2005 Religion News Service NEW YORK _ Mithal al-Alusi, 52, dressed in a conservative suit and tie, sat with his hands politely folded on the table of a midtown New York office, resigned to the dangers that surround him every day. For daring to visit Israel, he incurred the wrath of Iraqi insurgents who […]

COMMENTARY: More Than Ever, High Holy Days Needed for Reflection

By RNS Blog Editor — September 23, 2005

c. 2005 Religion News Service (UNDATED) It’s a good thing the Jewish High Holy Days _ Rosh Hashana (the Jewish New Year) and Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement) _ will soon be here. The two-day observance of Rosh Hashana begins Monday evening Oct. 3 and Yom Kippur, Judaism’s most sacred day, starts at sunset […]

RNS Daily Digest

By RNS Blog Editor — September 23, 2005

c. 2005 Religion News Service Government Support of Private Schools After Katrina Draws Mixed Reviews (RNS) An effort to direct taxpayer dollars to pay for private _ and sometimes religious _ school tuition as part of the recovery effort from Hurricane Katrina has prompted praise and criticism from organizations with views about vouchers. The U.S. […]

COMMENTARY: Simon Wiesenthal, a Force of Memory Against the Darkness of the Holocaust

By RNS Blog Editor — September 23, 2005

c. 2005 Religion News Service (UNDATED) A few days before Simon Wiesenthal died this week _ 60 years after the end of Nazi Germany _ the German soccer federation finally released a report admitting its enthusiastic collaboration with Hitlerism. Like so much of what happened at that time, the facts were shameful and sordid and […]

Grilling Judge Roberts

By Tracy Gordon — September 23, 2005

Quote of the Day: Wall Street Journal columnist Manuel Miranda “How insulting. How offensive. How invidiously ignorant to question someone like Judge Roberts with such apparent presumption and disdain for the religion he practices. The JFK question is not just the camel’s nose of religious intolerance; it is the whole smelly camel.” -Columnist Manuel Miranda, […]

The Voice of Guilt