Culture Wars 3.0

How we identify — according to race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion or gender — is at the heart of hundreds of bills in legislatures across the country. And as U.S. voters across the political spectrum gear up for the 2024 presidential cycle, debates are intensifying about how to define the nation’s values around these issues.

Just weeks ago, the U.S. Supreme Court announced it will hear arguments on the constitutionality of state bans on gender-affirming care for transgender minors.

The issue has emerged as a big one in the past few years. While transgender people have gained more visibility and acceptance in many respects, half of U.S. states have instituted laws banning certain health care services for transgender kids.

In recent years, voters have been particularly fired up about the lessons and books that should, and shouldn’t, be taught to children about their bodies or the nation’s past. But those culture wars have also come to corporate America and college sports.

These renewed culture wars have take over everything from local school board meetings to state legislatures and the U.S. Capitol.

In the following, I unpack how we got here and round up stories and sources for going deeper into the culture wars’ decadeslong history.

Their church basement used to host quinceañeras. Now it houses Mauritanian Muslims

“They call me Mom,” said Maria Elena Montalvo, pastor of Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bell, Calif., as she worked with Dioulde and Jallo, two asylum seekers from Mauritania, to mop the floors of the church basement where they have been staying since September 2023.

Dioulde and Jallo are two of 20 Mauritanians living in a space that used to be rented out for quinceañeras in the largely working-class area of southeast Los Angeles, where the population is 89.1 percent Latino. Now, in a space that families used to celebrate their daughters’ 15th birthdays under the sprinkling lights of a chandelier, there are rows of futon-style beds lined up against the walls, with folded Muslim prayer rugs, gallon-sized water bottles, and plastic sandals neatly stacked alongside. (Sojourners is withholding the full names of migrants in this story, at their request, due to the sensitivities of immigration status.)

Showing Dioulde how to work the mop bucket and telling Jallo to get the chicken out of the freezer so it can thaw for dinner that night, Montalvo cuts the figure of a mom giving her kids directions on their chores.

But her daughter, Jennifer Coria, 24, who works at the church, said with a wry smile, “She’s nicer to them than she is to us at home.”

For more than six years, Montalvo’s church has made space available to migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers arriving in Bell from countries in Central and South America and Mexico. But over the last nine months, Mauritanians like Dioulde and Jallo have come to call the 100-year-old church their home as well.

They arrived at the U.S.-Mexico border last summer…

How then shall we live, when the world is on fire?

Climate change is happening.

I am not a scientist. Nor do I pretend to be. But drawing on information taken from natural sources — like ice cores, rocks, and tree rings — recorded by satellites, and processed with the aid of the most advanced computer processors the world has ever known, NASA experts report “there is unequivocal evidence that Earth is warming at an unprecedented rate” and that “[h]uman activity is the principal cause.” 

From global temperature rise to melting ice sheets, glacial retreat to sea levels rising, the evidence of a warming planet abounds. While Earth’s climate has fluctuated throughout history, the current season of warming is happening at a rate not seen in 10 millennia — 10,000 years.

Many of the undergraduate students in courses introducing them to religious traditions — Islam, Christianity or otherwise — have no reservations about climate change and its disastrous effects on the environment and the most vulnerable in human society. In my classrooms, there is a palpable fear about the planet’s future. 

It is little wonder, then, that students often ask how religious actors interpret their sacred texts and confessions or how they, in turn, address climate change or engage with the environment. 

What they discover can often be disappointing — if not infuriating.

Faith & Politics: Your Religion Guide to the 2024 Elections

With just a few months to go until the U.S. holds elections on Nov. 5, 2024, reporters covering the intersections of religion and politics will face a common challenge: how to write about the varied politics of people of faith and cover the diverse roles religion(s) will play in this election.

White evangelicals, and the conflation of their faith with political conservatism in general, tend to dominate religion-related election news, to the neglect of other religious communities — Christian and otherwise.

In this edition of ReligionLink, we take a different approach. Rather than focusing on any one tradition, we break down ideas, sources and resources for reporting on the top issues at stake in the 2024 election(s).

Looking at seven issues from the perspective of diverse faith traditions in the U.S. — and the particular intersection of identifications, institutions and ideals they represent — helps us better get a sense of how religion may, or may not, play a role in determining the shape and outcome of this year’s vote.

"Cruel and racist": Faith leaders decry Biden's border shutdown

At a White House event hosting border-town mayors on June 4, President Joe Biden announced an executive order that would temporarily shut down the U.S.’s southern border to asylum requests when average daily migrant crossings at legal ports of entry exceed 2,500. The border would then reopen if the average falls below 1,500.

Many faith leaders expressed deep disappointment at the announcement. While they agree something needs to be done about increased numbers at the border, they told Sojourners that Biden’s unilateral actions are the wrong approach. They also expect the executive order to be struck down in the courts.

Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president and CEO of Global Refuge — formerly Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service — said in an email to Sojourners, “We are deeply concerned about the legality of this executive order and the moral implications of turning away asylum-seeking families desperate for protection.

“This is a troubling departure from an approach that balances the carrot and stick in favor of hardline restrictions,” added Vignarajah. “Our fear is that such restrictions would ultimately deny protection to persecuted individuals and families based on increasingly arbitrary factors, and not on the actual merits of their claim.”

Torn: Why Latino Evangelicals Don't Always Support Immigration Reform

Miguel Cárdenas came to the U.S. as a child in 1980. His parents brought him from the western Mexican state of Jalisco across the Rio Grande without documentation.

They went on to work for farms across Texas with the hope of giving their son a better life. Then, on Nov. 6, 1986, when Cárdenas was in fifth grade, President Ronald Reagan signed the Immigration Reform and Control Act into law, allowing around 3 million immigrants who entered the U.S. without papers before 1982 — including the Cárdenas family — the ability to apply for legal status.

“It’s the classic American dream,” Miguel, now 48, said. “I am eternally grateful to my parents and Reagan for making my life what it is today.”

That life is filled with family barbecues and hunting trips with his wife and three kids; building his insurance business in Houston; and volunteering his time with his local church, the Chamber of Commerce, and the Republican party in the greater Houston area. He enthusiastically supported former President Donald Trump’s campaigns in 2016 and 2020.

“Sometimes, people are surprised to meet a Mexican migrant who is pro-Trump,” Cárdenas said. “But then I remind them that of all people, we are pro-family, pro-security, pro-business.”

As Cárdenas makes clear, Latinos do not always support candidates with progressive immigration policies — including policies that expand legal pathways to citizenship, enforce fewer penalties for those who immigrate without documentation, or end sanctions that devastate economies and fuel immigration. Experts and members of the community say Latinos of faith, with or without an immigration background, can feel torn between theologies that emphasize respect for the rule of law, a cultural emphasis on the family, allegiances to denominations that encourage support for conservative candidates, and their own personal trajectories, like that of Cárdenas, that can lead them one way or the other.

Texas Ministries Say "the work of God can never be illegal"

Faith-based migrant ministries in Texas are used to operating in tough circumstances, including finding the right resources, meeting migrant needs, and funding their day-to-day work. But recent legal challenges have left some Texas faith leaders uncertain about the future of their ministries.

At the forefront of these legal challenges is Senate Bill 4, a bill passed by Texas lawmakers in 2023 which would make it a state crime for migrants to cross the border into Texas at any unauthorized point and allow authorities to arrest people for doing so. Though it was expected to go into effect in early March 2024, the bill was delayed by legal challenges from the U.S. Justice Department, framed as an unconstitutional infringement on the federal government’s power to set and enforce immigration law. The Supreme Court briefly cleared the way for the law’s implementation on March 19 before it was blocked just hours later when the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued an administrative stay. The court heard formal appeals on April 3 in New Orleans, but at the time of publication, the law remains blocked.

Many ministries feel that if SB4 is allowed to stand, the bill and ensuing legal actions will erode existing welcoming efforts across the state.

“SB4 will unequivocally create an environment of fear and distrust in local Texas communities, erode welcoming efforts, and legitimize racial profiling,” said Melissa Cedillo, a board member of Hope Border Institute, an organization working to advance justice and end poverty on the U.S./Mexico border.

Cedillo told Sojourners that families with members of different legal statuses, who already live in fear that one of their family members could be deported, may be more reticent to seek out care from migrant ministries.

“They may now feel they have to learn how to exist in the shadows, to live so that they are not noticed in the hope it might offer them some kind of protection, instead of shelters and hospitable ministries.

“The atmosphere these legal actions make may mean they will not even try to access these services or connect with ministries designed specifically for them,” she said.

AI is coming to your house of worship...if it isn't already there

When London imam Asim Khan asked ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence chatbot developed by OpenAI,  to write a khutbah (sermon) on taqwa (God consciousness) that lasts 10 minutes, he was surprised by the results, which left him “lost for words.” The generative AI program provided a sermon that was not only lucid, but eloquent.

He posted the video on X (formerly known as Twitter). While some commenters warned that AI would be “more harm than good” and that “Shaikh AI” should not replace the counsel of trained Islamic scholars, Khan also joked that his career might be over given how well ChatGPT responded to the prompt.

Jokes and gimmicks aside, there are now entire websites devoted to providing AI tools for pastors, preachers and other religious leaders looking to get a leg up on sermon prep.  At Sermonoutline.ai — owned and operated by Sermon Central and its parent company, Outreach Inc. — pastors are promised an AI sermon generator that can produce “biblical preaching” for their next Sunday service. For just $7.50 a month, subscribers have access to sermon outlines, starter ideas and full sermon manuscripts “using the power of AI,” according to the site.

Perhaps aware of potential apprehension, one of the site’s FAQs is: “What if my church finds out I used this site?” The response:

Sermon Outline AI is a reference tool for preachers. … Preaching in any context requires knowing your audience and making your material personal. Sermon Outline AI can’t do that, only the preacher can. If your church finds out you’re here, great! They’ll know you value your time.

Beyond writing Friday khutbahs and Sunday sermons, AI has numerous practical applications for religious communities and in worship spaces, say some leaders. At an Exponential Conference at First Baptist Church Orlando in March 2024, speakers Kenny Jahng, Yvonne Carlson, Josh Burnett and Corey Alderin talked about how AI could be used to boost a church’s community engagement, provide virtual worship services and create small-group Bible study guides.

As ethical reflections among religious leaders over AI’s use in everything from fatwas and Bible translation to the creation of autonomous weaponry and surveillance continues, communities of all kinds are adopting it — or adapting to it — as AI seems set to become a banal aspect of our everyday social, economic and religious lives (or already is).

Debates about the best ethical approach — including whether an AI religion can save or doom us all — will intensify. In the meantime, pastors are using it to edit sermons, and there is Robo Rabbi for the Jewish faith; KhalsaGPT for Sikhs; Mindar, an android priest, for Buddhism; and a multilingual Islamic chatbot named “Ansari” offering spiritual remedies and Islamic perspectives in Arabic, Bahasa Indonesian, Bosnian, English, French, Turkish, Urdu and other languages. Perhaps appealing to the growing ranks of the “spiritual but not religious,” ChatwithGod.ai wants to expand access to spiritual guidance for seekers from all religious backgrounds. It promises to “engage in conversation” with users “receiving personalized religious verses and comfort.”

While much of the conversation around AI — and generative AI in particular — can be alarmist, this resource focuses on the technology’s increasingly common uses in religious communities and places of worship around the world.

It provides background, related stories, sources and relevant resources for understanding how AI is already impacting the everyday realities of our spiritual lives.

Evangelicals want immigration reform. Here's why they're unlikely to get it

What do evangelicals in the U.S. want? Immigration reform.

When do they want it? Now.

When will they get it? No time soon, it seems.

According to a recent Lifeway Research poll sponsored by the Evangelical Immigration Table and other evangelical groups, evangelicals desire immigration reform with increasing urgency. Showing a marked increase from prior years, 77 percent of poll respondents say it is important that Congress passes significant new immigration legislation in 2024 — up from 71 percent in 2022 and 68 percent in 2015.

Their opinions are in line with the wider U.S. population, which generally agrees that the current immigration system needs to be reformed. Different political groups, however, rarely agree on what exactly is broken or how to fix it.

Among evangelical leaders, the consensus is that the legislation should be both bipartisan andcomprehensive. That is the golden standard, said Chelsea Sobolik, director of government relations at World Relief — the humanitarian arm of the National Association of Evangelicals, and one of the poll’s sponsors.

Research from political scientists Ruth Melkonian-Hoover and Lyman A. Kellstedt confirms that evangelical clergy and denominational leadership tend to support immigration reform efforts, and have stepped up their involvement to support them, based on biblical principles of “welcoming the stranger.” But a combination of partisanship, presidential voting preferences, and right-wing cultural populist attitudes mean not all evangelicals feel the same, they write. In particular, white evangelical laity historically view the effects of immigration most negatively and favor the most restrictive immigration policies.

From her time working in the nation’s capital, Sobolik knows immigration issues can draw strong passions from different populations and political factions. Nonetheless, she believes in the power of faith to motivate lawmakers to find bipartisan solutions by meeting on common sacred ground.

“Americans of faith want leaders who will work together on immigration and sensible border solutions,” Sobolik said in an interview. “They want pragmatic reforms that offer increased security infrastructure without sacrificing compassion and human dignity.

“In the end, they want a different, more reasonable conversation,” she said.

Sobolik suggested those sensible solutions draw on the principles proposed by the Evangelical Immigration Table, which include: respect for the God-given dignity of every person; protecting the unity of the immediate family; respecting the rule of law; guaranteeing secure national borders; ensuring fairness to taxpayers; and establishing a path toward legal status and/or citizenship for those who qualify and who wish to become permanent residents.

On the Frontiers of Psychedelic-Assisted Chaplaincy and Spiritual Care

Hannah remembers exactly where she was when she got the news her father was killed by a hit-and-run driver. Out for dinner and drinks with friends in Seattle, she noticed the missed call first. Then, the text messages from her older sister. When she stepped outside to talk to her mom on the phone, her father was already gone.

“I just stood there, frozen,” the 38-year-old said, “looking out and taking in the details. The way the sidewalk smelled after recent rain. The squeaking sound of the restaurant door as it swung open. The way a red light reflected off a puddle across the street. Every detail just singed into my memory.”

But Hannah could not remember the weeks and months that followed. “There was just a blur, a blank spot,” she said. There were family gatherings, a funeral, boxes of photos, and other details that Hannah struggled to recall.

Though the particulars were missing, the despair she felt only deepened. After a couple of years, her prolonged feelings of sadness and hopelessness drove her to seek therapy. She was prescribed antidepressants, but nothing seemed to help. Hannah withdrew from her church community and friends, developed anger management issues, and struggled with suicidal thoughts.

But then, Hannah came across a 2013 study from the University of South Floridaabout how psilocybin, the psychedelic compound found in “magic mushrooms,” can stimulate nerve cell growth in parts of the brain responsible for emotion and memory.

She sought out a counselor in Oregon who could guide her as she used psilocybin to access aspects of her memory she wanted to get in touch with again to help process the pain she continued to feel at the loss of her dad. More than psychological treatment, however, Hannah was also seeking spiritual solace. She did not want simply to recall the facts or feelings of her intense grief; Hannah was in search of something deeper: “I wanted to remember, to see how God was at work even then, in one of the darkest moments of my life.”

Now a spiritual director who offers similar services in the Seattle area, Hannah is part of a growing number of Christians, Jews, Buddhists, and others seeking out psychedelic-assisted chaplaincy and spiritual care to address psychological trauma and unanswered spiritual questions. Some, in search of mystical experiences, are also looking for unexplored avenues of spiritual connection to process suffering or to encounter the divine.

As part of a more general renaissance of interest in the potential medicinal and spiritual benefits psychedelics may provide, a slew of researchers, chaplains, theologians, and spiritual care professionals are asking questions about how substances like psilocybin connect the potency of mystical experience with the promise, and possibility, of mental healing.

They hope that in the next decade or so, new studies, therapies, and theological revolutions will lead to a breakthrough in the use of psychedelics for religious insight and remedial spiritual care.

Language, Preaching, and the Politics of Immigration

How does the language preachers, politicians or reporters use impact the kind of immigration policies we might make or opinions we have about migrants themselves?

In my first two pieces as Faith and Immigration Reporter at Sojourners magazine, I take a look at both issues.

In the one, I explore how more than colloquial conundrum, the language we use determines the policies we support and the theologies we hold about people crossing borders.

In the other, I talk to pastors and theologians about how they are navigating the political polarization around the topic from their pulpits.

From Puerto Rico to Palestine, with Solidarity

“We’ve been here before,” Margarita says as she holds a sign with bold, red and green letters exclaiming, Basta ya genocido! Variously translated as “enough is enough” or “stop already,” basta ya is a Spanish exclamation of exasperation. And Margarita is exasperated. “What I mean is [that] we’ve done this before,” she explains, “when they [the Israeli military] evicted families in Sheikh Jarrah in 2021, when Israel invaded Gaza in 2014, after Hurricane María, when they [the U.S. Navy] bombed Vieques, during the Second Intifada, I was out here, protesting. Enough is enough!”

Wearing a loose, floral, floor-length dress, brown jacket, and burgundy head covering, Margarita joined thousands of other Puerto Ricans in November 2023 demonstrating in Brooklyn and Manhattan on behalf of Palestinians, demanding a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war. At the march, Puerto Rican flags flew next to Palestinian ones alongside signs reading Puerto Rico con Palestina or “Puerto Ricans for Palestine.” Other protestors paired keffiyehs, headdresses that have become associated with Palestinians, with black-and-white banners representing Puerto Rican resistance to U.S. colonialism.

As a Puerto Rican convert to Islam, Margarita feels compelled to take to the streets. But even before she became Muslim, Margarita possessed a sense of solidarity with people in Gaza and the West Bank. “We share a history of oppression, of being under empire’s foot, of being a people without a nation,” she says, “so I’ll continue to show up until Palestine and Puerto Rico are free.”

Puerto Rican demonstrations for justice in Palestine, and Palestinian solidarity with Puerto Ricans, is nothing new. Forged in their common colonial condition, Puerto Ricans and Palestinians have long spoken up — and out — for each other’s fight against imperialism and for independence.

But for Puerto Rican Muslims in the archipelago and diaspora, that solidarity takes on additional, resonant meaning. For some, their faith imbues their solidarity with divine purpose. For others, it is solidarity that leads them to faith in the first place.

Feast or fast, food and faith

“You’d think we’d lose weight during Ramadan,” said Amina, a registered dietician who observes the Islamic month of fasting each year in Arizona, “but you’d be wrong.”

Ramadan, the ninth month of the lunar calendar, is a month of fasting for Muslims across the globe. Throughout the month, which starts this year around March 11, observers do not eat or drink from dawn to sunset.

“It sounds like a recipe for weight loss,” Amina said, “but you’d be wrong. I’ve found it’s much more common for clients — of all genders and ages — to gain weight during the season.”

The combined result of consuming fat-rich foods at night when breaking the fast (iftar), numerous celebratory gatherings with family and friends, decreased physical activity and interrupted sleep patterns means many fasters are surprised by the numbers on the scale when the festival at the end of the month (Eid al-Fitr) comes around.

Christians observing the traditional fasting period of Lent (February 14 - March 30, 2024) can also experience weight gain as they abstain from things like red meat or sweets. Despite popular “Lent diets” and conversations around getting “shredded” during the fasting season, many struggle with their weight during the penitential 40-days prior to Easter, the celebration of Jesus’ resurrection.

The convergence of the fasting seasons for two of the world’s largest religions meet this month, and people worrying about weight gain during them, got me thinking about the wider relevance of food to faith traditions.

And so, in two pieces — one for ReligionLink and the other for Patheos — I take a deeper look at how foodways might help us better understand this thing we call “religion” more broadly.

Piano, piano: In Europe, evangelicals are divided over the right relationship with Rome.

Leonardo De Chirico is in an ongoing argument with the Italian government about the “intrinsic characteristics” of religious buildings.

The evangelical pastor insists that Breccia di Roma (Breach of Rome), which is located in a simple storefront about a kilometer from the Colosseum, is a church. Christians meet there regularly to pray, praise God, and listen to the preaching of the Word. The national tax authority has noted, though, that the multifunctional space, which also houses a theological library and a missions training center, does not have the vaulted ceilings, stained glass, raised altar, candles, or saint statues commonly associated with churches in the majority-Catholic country and therefore doesn’t qualify for religious tax exemptions.

“The arguments are silly and poor,” De Chirico told CT. “The pictures they showed were of impressive buildings, but we showed that Muslim prayer rooms are simple and some Catholic churches meet in shops. Synagogues look like our space. They are all tax-exempt. We are not asking for privilege. We are not asking for something that others don’t have.”

This conflict has been going on since 2016. A lower court sided with the Reformed Baptist church, but the tax authority filed an appeal. The case is now going to Italy’s Supreme Court.

But tax-exempt status is not the most serious disagreement De Chirico has with Italians about what a church is. In 2014, he wrote a pamphlet critiquing the papacy. In 2021, the Reformed pastor and theology chair of the Italian Evangelical Alliance wrote a book arguing that the “theological framework of Roman Catholicism is not faithful to the biblical gospel.”

So it frustrated him, to say the least, when Thomas Schirrmacher, the head of the World Evangelical Alliance (WEA), joined an ecumenical prayer vigil in St. Peter’s Square, Vatican City, in September. It seemed to him that the secretary general of the global evangelical association was embracing the spiritual leadership of Pope Francis and endorsing a vision of unity not grounded in the gospel.

“When you pray with someone in public, you are saying that the differences between our theologies are mere footnotes,” De Chirico said. “Dialogue is welcome, but there are core differences we cannot forget or ignore.”

In my latest for Christianity Today, I take a look at how European evangelicals approach church planting, ecumenical dialogue and other issues in contexts where Catholicism remains predominant.

What's behind the rising hate?

At the end of last year, the uptick in antisemitic and Islamophobic incidents in the U.S. and around the globe captured headlines as part of the fallout from the Israel-Hamas war.

Reactions were swift and widespread, as university presidents resigned, demonstrators took to the streets in places such as Berlin and Paris and the White House promised to take steps to curb religious and faith-based hate in the U.S.

The topic of rising discrimination and incidents of hate remains contentious, as political polarization and debate over definitions challenge reporters covering the issues.

But before we come to conclusions, it’s important to consider a) what we are talking about - or - how we define antisemitism and Islamophobia and b) the long arc of “Other” hate across time.

In the latest editions of ReligionLink and “What You Missed Without Religion Class,” I unpack both so we can better understand and react to the surge in hate.

Tomorrow’s religion news, today

At the beginning of last year, I predicted the Pope would be big news in 2023.

While I thought it would be because of his declining health and increased age, it turned out that Pope Francis had big plans to cement his long-term hopes for renewal, which are likely to outlast his pontifical reign.

In 2023, Pope Francis remained busy, traveling widely, convening a historic synod, denouncing anti-LGBTQ+ laws and approving letting priests bless same-sex couples, overseeing the Vatican repudiation of the Doctrine of Discovery and facing various controversies.

For all the above, he was named 2023’s Top Religion Newsmaker by members of the Religion News Association, a 74-year-old association for reporters who cover religion in the news media.

Beyond Francis and the Vatican, there were other major headlines in 2023: the Israel-Hamas war, along with the rise in antisemitic and Islamophobic incidents in the U.S. and around the globe, ongoing legislative and legal battles following last year's Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v. Wade, the exodus of thousands of congregations from the United Methodist Church and the nationwide political debates over sexuality and transgender rights and the Anglican Communion verging on schism.

While it is one thing to look back on the top religion stories of the year, what about predicting — as I did with the Pope — what will be the big religion news in 2024?

In 2024, we will see ongoing wars in places like Gaza, Ukraine, Yemen and Nargono-Karabakh continuing to capture headlines. So too the state of antisemitism and anti-Muslim discrimination. The ubiquity and uncertainty of artificial intelligence should also be on our radars, as should news related to the intersections of spirituality and climate change, the fate of global economies and how religious communities adapt to the ruptures and realignments associated with an increasingly multipolar world.

For more on my predictions, as well as additional sources and resources to explore, click the link below.

And to go even deeper into 2024’s religion predictions, you can explore my analysis of religion’s role in ongoing conflicts, upcoming elections and more by checking out my column, “What You Missed Without Religion Class.”

Contradictory Conditions: Jewish Life in East Germany, Past and Present

It’s a decidedly blustery day on Karl Marx Street in Eisenach, in the eastern German state of Thuringia. Gold and rust-tinted leaves scatter the ground of a small park marking the site of the town’s former synagogue—burned down by a Nazi mob on Kristallnacht, the nationwide pogroms on November 9, 1938.

Tucked away in a quiet corner not far from Eisenach’s theater, the memorial is one of 32 sites across Thuringia—spots where synagogues were desecrated or destroyed that night in 1938. Of the many previously active synagogues, only a few remain today. Only one has been rebuilt for weekly services. The others are marked by memorial stones and stairways leading to nowhere—including empty lots or garden plots, apartment buildings, and even a grocery store. Where the small town of Vacha’s synagogue once stood, there is now a hobby shop.

These places dot the east German landscape, from Potsdam to Zwickau, Dresden to Magdeburg. Along with other memorials like Stolpersteine—stones with brass plates bearing the names of Holocaust (Shoah) victims, laid in the pavement in front of their former homes and businesses—they stand as stark reminders of the absent presence of the region’s once thriving Jewish population. They are places where the palpable influence of eastern Germany’s Jews remains potent, even where they are no longer present.

They also signal the Jewish community’s present absence. Since the Shoah, under sometimes radically conflicting conditions, a range of diverse Jews have returned, resettled, and restored a sense of Jewish life across the former East German Republic (GDR). But the community is less-than-half what it was in pre-war Germany.

In places like Berlin, Leipzig, and Erfurt, Jews’ stories over the last century speak to lives lived between far-right politics and those of the far-left, communism and capitalism, growth and decline, remembrance culture (Erinnerungskultur) and an ominously encroaching antisemitism. Looking at East Germany–past and present–through Jewish eyes reveals today’s controversies are nothing new.

The challenges Jews in Germany faced following the Holocaust, including perils to their very existence, have shaped Jewish lives in the east for decades. The story of how under such conditions they still preserved their heritage is decades long. Now, facing declining demographics, a resurgent antisemitism, and fearing a far-right political turn, eastern Germany’s Jewish communities are once again under threat. And, once more, they are not only preserving their heritage, but claiming their place in German society.

U.S. Presidential Primaries: The Religion Source Guide

Buckle up, cause presidential primary season is about to really get underway.

With Iowa Republicans gathering to caucus on Jan. 15, New Hampshire’s controversial primaries coming for both parties on Jan. 23 and a flurry of primaries and caucuses following in quick succession after that, U.S. presidential politics are going to take an increasingly prime spot in our news coverage.

The road to 270 Electoral College votes next year will likely careen back-and-forth on a range of issues, from Social Security and Medicare to abortion and immigration. Along the way, it is important not to lose sight of the critical role the faith factor will play in how voters view each issue, potentially deciding who voters will choose in 2024. 

As many (re)learned in the last two elections, we ignore religion’s role in presidential elections at our peril.  

With next year unlikely to prove an exception to the rule of religion’s influence in presidential politics, this source guide provides an overview of several candidates’ faith backgrounds and angles on how religion may influence their electability in the year to come. 

Background

Despite a decline in overall religious adherence, faith continues to influence U.S. politics, not least because, in the shift from privilege to plurality, religious Americans — particularly of the evangelical variety — are not going quietly. The result is that the demographic change, where an increasing number of Americans identify as nonreligious and Christians might soon be a minority, has not meant more consensus, but increasingly polarized debates about the role of faith in U.S. public life.

The fault lines are many and include debates over access to, or restrictions on, abortion, and culture war and church-state separation issues such as banning materials dealing with sexuality and gender identity from schools or discussions of “critical race theory” from the classroom. Feeling ever more like a minority, conservative religious actors have embraced the mantle of “religious freedom,” positioning themselves as needing protection from the encroachments of a leftist agenda, led by a secular majority. All of this is cast against a background of increased “Christian nationalism,” the desire that the nation’s civic life be defined by Christianity — in its identification, history, symbols, values and public policies — and that the government take active steps to enforce this view and impose it on the populace.

At the same time, actors on the religious left can be seen at the front of protests and marches advocating for civil rights, gun control, access to abortion and immigration reform. And prominent Democrats such as Raphael Warnock and Joe Biden position their faith as a core component of their political platforms. The religious left, thought to be dormant for decades, has been quietly resurgent in recent years and may shape the 2024 elections in a significant way.

The impact of these demographic realities, debates and differing perspectives has been uneven, varying from state to state based on their respective populations, politics and histories. Some are asserting a kind of Christian identity and enacting policies that are in line with their interpretation thereof. Others are adopting what they see as more secular laws appropriate for a more plural society.

In any event, religion will — as it always has — play a prominent role in the primary season and, inevitably, during next autumn’s general elections. In fact, this year might feature one of the most religiously diverse batch of presidential candidates we have yet seen, reflecting the nation’s shifting, and increasingly plural, religious landscape.

BBC Radio 4 Interview

From the BBC:

This week's Sunday explores the latest on the conflict in the Middle East, and its repercussions in the UK for Jewish and Muslim communities. The archbishops of Canterbury and Jerusalem unite in a call for peace. As the Metropolitan Police reports a spike in anti-semitic hate incidents, a Jewish woman from London tells the programme how her Muslim friends escorted her to synagogue in an act of solidarity. And we examine the significance of the site of the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem with Ken Chitwood, a site layered in history and meaning for Muslims and Jews alike.

Courage to Act: The Rescue Of Danish Jews During The Holocaust Continues To Inspire

For Rabbi Jair Melchior, the rescue of Danish Jews during the Holocaust is more than a story, it’s an everyday reminder.  

Eighty years ago this month, the Danish people helped rescue their Jewish neighbors, secretly providing transport by sea to Sweden over the course of three weeks. Ordinary Danes saved nearly 95% of the country’s 7,800 Jews. Marcus Melchior, Jair’s great-grandfather, played an instrumental role in the rescue. 

The Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York City will open a new exhibit on Oct. 15 that explores the rescue called  “Courage to Act: Rescue in Denmark.” Intended particularly for children and adolescents, the interactive exhibit not only commemorates the event, but asks visitors to confront the question: How would you respond if you heard a cry for help today? 

And that, said Melchior, puts demands not only on museum goers, but the community he serves in Denmark today. 

“It’s demanding,” the 32 year old rabbi said, “not only of our gratitude — three of my grandparents were on those boats — but also of our lives. We have to do the same for others who are in need. If we don’t, the historical lessons have not been learned.”