In the post-apocalyptic world of The Book of Eli, the most precious things on earth are a trial-size bottle of shampoo; a cache of hand wipes, individually wrapped; and the last existing copy of the King James Bible. Denzel Washington, […]
Eli’s Coming – Denzel Takes on the Good Book Read More »
BeliefWatch: Lisa Miller, Newsweek, ReligionSeven percent of Americans say they “attend religious services in someone’s home.” This surprising little fact was buried in a recent survey by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, which showed that Americans are as loosey-goosey in their
House of Worship: Finding Spirituality at Home Read More »
BeliefWatch: Lisa Miller, Newsweek, ReligionThe YouTube video is almost too corny to believe. The year is 1955. A young boy, about 6 and afflicted with polio, is sitting on Oral Roberts’s lap. With praise and prayer, the preacher touches the boy all over his
An American Original: Oral Roberts Read More »
BeliefWatch: Lisa Miller, Newsweek, ReligionRick Warren, the evangelical pastor who drew fire last January when he gave the invocation at President Obama’s inauguration, is to be lauded for his fortitude. In a videotaped statement released last week, Warren condemned proposed legislation in Uganda that
Rick Warren Finally Opposes Uganda Anti-Homosexual Law Read More »
BeliefWatch: Lisa Miller, Newsweek, ReligionHeaven, according to polls, is a place nearly everyone wants to go to, so why don’t movies ever remotely capture that yearning? We all carry inchoate visions of heaven around in our heads, but we don’t realize how bruising another’s
Heaven on Film – the Lovely Bones Read More »
BeliefWatch: Lisa Miller, NewsweekWere I to submit my cells to DNA tests, results would doubtless show that —barring any surprises—I am a Jew. I have four Jewish grandparents. Genetically speaking, I share a common ancestry with most Jews, no matter where they live,
We suffer, this week, from a moral myopia. Thanks to the passage in Congress of a health-reform bill, abortion is in the news again, but with the same old warriors brandishing their same old spears. Kate Michelman and Frances Kissling
Health Care: Abortion Is Not the Only Moral Issue Read More »
BeliefWatch: Lisa Miller, NewsweekWe are giving ourselves shallow and untenable choices. Either Islam is a religion that condones violence. Or Islam is a religion of peace. Either Maj. Nidal Hasan, who opened fire at the Army base in Fort Hood, Texas, last week,
Hasan was both a Fundamentalist and a Terrorist Read More »
BeliefWatch: Lisa Miller, NewsweekAt Harvard, it’s sounding a lot like the ’70s again. Thanks to the provocations of True Love Revolution, the university’s three-year-old pro-abstinence club, brainy women are defending their right to have sex with whomever they want, whenever and however they
The Fight over Abstinence at Harvard Read More »
BeliefWatch: Lisa Miller, NewsweekThe novelist and literary critic Mary Gordon loves the story of the prodigal son, for she is a Catholic in her bones. The story, from the Gospels, is of a father’s extravagant love for his proud and dissolute boy, a
Mary Gordon’s Rethinking of the Gospels Read More »
BeliefWatch: Lisa Miller, Newsweek