As midnight approached on the eve of the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday, the conservative-majority Supreme Court granted emergency requests by Christian and Jewish groups challenging COVID-19 crowd restrictions imposed by New York state.
Judge orders forfeiture of ancient tablet from Museum of the Bible
A federal judge has ordered Hobby Lobby, the arts and crafts chain whose president is Museum of the Bible founder Steve Green, to forfeit an ancient tablet bearing a rare fragment of the Epic of Gilgamesh.
Designer who won’t make same-sex wedding websites loses case
A U.S. appeals court has ruled against a web designer who didn’t want to create wedding websites for same-sex couples and sued to challenge Colorado’s anti-discrimination law, another twist in a series of court rulings nationwide about whether businesses denying…
Police officer says Jan. 6 insurrectionists ‘perceived themselves to be Christians’
Describing insurrectionists who attacked the U.S. Capitol as “terrorists” who “perceived themselves to be Christians,” District of Columbia police officer Daniel Hodges told a congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection on Tuesday (July 27) that the crowd massing on…
Study: Only half of American households donate to charity
For the first time in nearly two decades, only half of U.S. households donated to a charity, according to a study released Tuesday. The findings confirm a trend worrying experts: Donations to charitable causes are reaching record highs, but the…
Reparations bill gains momentum as an interfaith cause
A pastor in Evanston, Illinois, the first U.S. city to adopt a municipal initiative on reparations, told a gathering of faith leaders on Thursday (July 22) that they can play a key role in moving a community toward action on…
U.S. seizes Jewish funeral scrolls, manuscripts thought ‘lost for all time’ in Holocaust
The Justice Department on Thursday announced the seizure of 17 funeral scrolls, manuscripts and community records that were looted from Eastern European Jewish communities annihilated in the Holocaust more than three-quarters of a century ago.
Billy Graham’s grandson Jonathan Lotz, son of Anne Graham Lotz, in hospital with COVID-19
Jonathan Lotz, the grandson of evangelist Billy Graham and son of Bible teacher Anne Graham Lotz, has been hospitalized and is in critical condition with COVID-19.
In Japan, Greek-influenced Olympics meet another kind of pagan heritage
The lighting of an eternal flame, the spiritual aura of heroism and triumph, the parades at once boisterous and solemn: The Olympic rituals that stir our hearts each time the Games roll around all take their inspiration from pagan Greek religious life,…