David Gibson is an award-winning religion journalist, author and filmmaker. He writes for Religion News Service and until recently covered the religion beat for AOL’s Politics Daily. He blogs at Commonweal magazine, and has written two books on Catholic topics, the latest a biography of Pope Benedict XVI.
NEW YORK (RNS) The story of a gay Catholic man who was relieved of all duties at his Long Island parish just got more interesting: His bishop returned a petition with 18,000 signatures with a one-line cover letter: “FROM YOUR FAITHFUL ROMAN CATHOLIC BISHOP.”
(RNS) Reports this week that the late John Paul II may be on the verge on canonization isn’t a huge surprise, but Pope Francis’ decision to take a second look at martyred Salvadoran archbishop Oscar Romero shows that the process of making saints is as much about politics as anything else.
The mentor-acolyte motif is being investigated as a possible factor in the Boston bombings, while other trails are also followed. Did Jesus wear Chuck Taylors? Go ahead, Royals, marry a Catholic!
(RNS) Leading U.S. Catholic bishops on Monday (April 22) denounced efforts to use the Boston Marathon bombings to derail the push for immigration reform, saying it is wrong to brand all immigrants as dangerous.
Is “eye for an eye” actually a better way to think about justice? Should the government be more active in trying to “destroy radical Islam?” The old pope gets a new portrait — what do you think?
(RNS) No sooner had the reality of the Boston marathon bombing sunk in than Muslim activists began sending out news releases and tweets condemning whoever was responsible. It’s a familiar sprint for these groups as some were blaming Muslims for the bombings.
(RNS) Richard Land, who is retiring from his longtime job as policy point man for the Southern Baptists after a series of controversies, will take over as head of an evangelical seminary in North Carolina.
Religion in the Coen brothers films, a fortress for an Orthodox enclave, and more Catholic debates — and some high-level disputes — about the role of gay Catholics in the church and whether supporting gay marriage (or civil unions) is okay. Or not.
(RNS) The gay man ousted from posts at his New York parish after a critic complained that he had married his partner delivered a petition with more than 18,000 signatures on Thursday to Bishop William Murphy asking to be reinstated.
If you exposed an anti-Semitic Klan leader as a Jew himself and he committed suicide, how would you feel? The late McCandlish Phillips had an answer. Is “What Would Pope Francis Do?” the new question? Is the HHS contraception mandate “religious persecution”?
