In the News, February 22, 2016

February 22, 2016

Today's religion and world affairs new from the United States and around the globe: religious leaders consider the pros of contraception in response to the Zika outbreak, the rise of Jewish terrorism, France after ISIS attacks, and the role of religion in U.S. Supreme Court nominations. 

BERKLEY CENTER IN THE NEWS

Pope Francis Isn't the Only Religious Leader to Give a Surprising Boost to Contraception
by Noam N. Levey
Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/world/asia/la-fg-contraception-world-religion-20160219-story.html
Enlisting religious groups in family planning campaigns has been a delicate task, as faith leaders have historically been wary of efforts to limit family size. Modern contraceptives, some of which are seen as inducing abortion, have been even more controversial.​ ​As a result, some family planning advocates steered clear of local religious leaders. “People are afraid of stirring up opposition,” said Katherine Marshall, senior fellow at Georgetown University’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs.​ With progress slowing in many countries, advocates are now engaging churches, mosques and other faith-based institutions with messages that harmonize family planning with traditional religious teachings, including those that encourage procreation. 

AROUND THE WORLD
 
After the Paris Terror Attacks, France Struggles with Faith on the Job
by Nicola Clark
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/21/business/international/after-paris-terror-attacks-france-struggles-with-faith-on-the-job.html?ref=business
Reconciling the religious precepts of observant Muslims with the secular norms in the European workplace has long been a sensitive subject. France’s strict legal separation of religious and civic life — a legacy of the French Revolution known as laïcité — formally discourages, and in some situations expressly bans, public religious expression. It is a brand of secularism that coexists uneasily with Islamic traditions, making workplace negotiations about religious practice particularly difficult and prone to misunderstandings.

Martyrs? Desperate? Crazy? Palestinians Struggle to Define Palestinians who Attack Israelis
by William Booth
Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/martyrs-desperate-crazy-palestinians-struggle-to-define-palestinians-who-attack-israelis/2016/02/20/13dbf108-a364-11e5-8318-bd8caed8c588_story.html
The Israelis are clear. They call it “terrorism.” Yet after five months of near-daily violence against Israelis, Palestinian society struggles with how to describe the wave of knife, gun and vehicular attacks targeting Israeli soldiers and civilians. If Palestinians on the street are uncertain about what to call the ongoing violence, the Palestinian leadership appears paralyzed over word choices.

Playing with Fire: The Rise of Jewish Terrorism
by Mitch Ginsburg
Foreign Affairs
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/israel/2016-02-18/playing-fire
Although not nearly as common or as bloody as Arab terrorist attacks against Jews in Israel, Jewish terrorism has shaped Israeli society, too. Today’s Jewish terrorists mostly come from the far right like their predecessors, but they differ in their targets and in their ultimate goals. The extreme right in Israel consists of two slightly overlapping but fundamentally different camps: the thugs and the zealots. 

Hindu Priest Beheaded in Bangladesh: ISIS Said to Claim Responsibility
by Julfikar Ali Manik
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/23/world/asia/hindu-priest-beheaded-in-bangladesh-isis-said-to-claim-responsibility.html?ref=world&_r=0
The top priest of a Hindu temple in northern Bangladesh was beheaded by unidentified attackers on Sunday, officials said, in a killing that was claimed on a social media account attributed to the Islamic State. 

NATIONAL
Put an Atheist on the Supreme Court
by Lawrence Krauss 
New Yorker 
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/put-an-atheist-on-the-supreme-court
From a judicial perspective, an atheist Justice would be an asset. In controversial cases about same-sex marriage, say, or access to abortion or birth control, he or she would be less likely to get mired in religion-based moral quandaries.  

Facebook Post Revives Debate on Whether Monotheists Worship Same God
by Mark Oppenheimer 
New York Times
http://nyti.ms/20IgCc2
The idea that all monotheists, particularly Jews, Christians and Muslims, worship or pray to the same god has some support among religious people of all three traditions. The question has been debated for millenniums, and the issue has never been settled. Far from crossing some well-known theological line, Dr. Hawkins was venturing onto disputed territory, where nobody knows the exact boundaries. 

Trump’s Remarks on Pig’s Blood Elicit Challenge From Sister of Chapel Hill Victim
by Liam Stack
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/23/us/politics/trump-pigs-blood-sister-chapel-hill-victim-barakat.html
Suzanne Barakat, the sister of a Muslim student killed alongside his wife and sister-in-law last year in an attack in North Carolina, challenged Donald J. Trump to meet with her after a speech in which he spoke approvingly of killing Islamic terrorists with bullets dipped in the blood of pigs. 

Why Donald Trump’s Glitzy Style is Attracting Evangelical Voters
by Sarah Posner
Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2016/02/22/why-donald-trumps-glitzy-style-is-attracting-evangelical-voters/
Donald Trump seems to be the unlikeliest Republican candidate for evangelical voters, with his three marriages, his ownership of casinos and beauty pageants, and his belated opposition to their core issues of abortion and marriage. Yet he captured the votes of 33 percent of evangelicals in South Carolina on Saturday...Trump is arguably the candidate most resembling a televangelist.
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