A new survey of Jewish communal organizations found that 50 percent of them have taken significant steps to welcome gays and lesbians and their families. The Jewish Organization Equality Index provides benchmarks for gauging and improving policies …

PORTLAND, Ore. (RNS) Three states made history Tuesday (Nov. 6) voting to approve same-sex marriage, and a fourth repudiated an attempt to ban it. Oregon, once known as a trailblazer for progressive causes, wasn’t among them. But …

Less the 24 hours after Barack Obama won his reelection campaign on Tuesday, a new kind of campaign was launching in a sold out auditorium in downtown Seattle. For the climate activists at 350.org, it didn’t necessarily …

“It’s demography, stupid!” is the new mantra for analyzing the 2012 election, in which African Americans, Asian Americans and Latinos cast their votes in overwhelming numbers for President Obama. But religious diversity was another key theme. How …

The Queen has approved the nomination of the Right Reverend Justin Welby for election as the 105th Archbishop of Canterbury. He will succeed Dr Rowan Williams who is retiring at the end of December after ten years …

The other tack that emerged, however, was to concede that Christian conservatives may need to change the tone if not the substance of their message in order to appeal to voters who are increasingly non-male, non-white and …

Mitt Romney didn’t lose the election because he’s a Mormon, he lost because he isn’t Mormon enough. All political candidates must prove that they’re just like us, yet this requires some demystification: you cannot just tell us …

As Hurricane Sandy heads ashore on the east coast of the U.S., far right-wing religious zealots are already calling it a sign from God for everything from U.S. policy on Israel to, of course, the gays. The …

Mark Silk assesses the religious layout of 12 battleground states – and explains why religion will matter on Election Day. Arizona If Arizona is a battleground state this year, it’s because of the influx of Latinos over the …

Over the past decade scientists thought they had figured out how to protect humanity from the worst dangers of climate change. Keeping planetary warming below two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) would, it was thought, avoid such …

The University of San Diego has canceled a visiting fellowship for a British theologian less than two weeks before her scheduled arrival at the university because of pressure from financial contributors, according to a letter from the …

ST. GEORGE, Utah (RNS) U.S. Mormons overwhelmingly share the party affiliation of Republican presidential nominee and fellow Mormon Mitt Romney, but there are liberal-leaning members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who are finding …

One of the things that makes Sandy different from Katrina is that it’s a relatively clean story. The lessons of Katrina were numerous and painful—they had to do with race, with class, with the willful incompetence of …

Watch Climate of Doubt on PBS. See more from FRONTLINE. This story was originally posted on PBS Frontline.

Rachel Held Evans doesn’t want to talk about her vagina anymore. “I’m sorry,” said a spokesman for her publisher, Thomas Nelson, in turning down a request for an interview, “she’s a little uncomfortable continuing with this conversation.” …

The last 10 weeks of this election season have made me sick and tired of ignorant men pontificating on the reproductive lives of women. And I’m a man! I can only imagine how women feel. Todd Akin …

Four years ago, when Barack Obama and John McCain met for a town hall debate, they met as two men who each accepted the scientific consensus that fossil fuels were warming our planet. They met as two …

Let me just make a few things clear up front: I don’t care that Dinesh D’Souza is engaged to another woman while still legally married to his wife. I recognize that the editor and publisher of WORLD have a history with D’Souza …