THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER: These questions will strike most people as absurd, but they’re taken seriously in a heterodox assessment of the great Christian Apostle by staff writer Adam Gopnik in the April 20 New Yorker magazine. In amusing asides, Gopnik likens Paul’s style to that of Leon Trotsky, the Communist founder assassinated by order of Stalin. And since Frank Capra mused about a movie with Frank Sinatra playing St. Paul, Gopnik nominates rakish Dean Martin as St. Peter. The... Read more
THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER: As with “Christian nationalism,” this is a rather slippery term that can be used to browbeat religious and political opponents. The relation between Christianity and Israel is vastly complex, and this article can merely try to clarify a few aspects. Merriam-Webster defines Zionism as “an international movement originally for the establishment of a Jewish national or religious community in the historical region of Palestine and later for the support of modern Israel.” Since modern Israel was... Read more
What Does Dying Sasse Believe? THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER: Ben Sasse is dying. In fact, doctors thought the 54-year-old former U.S. Senator from Nebraska might already be dead by now after he was diagnosed before Christmas with stage four pancreatic cancer, beyond surgical help. Yet he gets to celebrate another festival of eternal life thanks to aggressive chemotherapy at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, along with morphine to control pain. During a round of media appearances, Sasse said... Read more
THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER: With the American-Israeli war on Iran monopolizing the news – and driving up prices at the gas pump – the full context requires understanding of the surprising 1979 Islamist revolution when the nation lurched from tyranny under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (and his father before him) to tyranny under the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Ever since, a theocracy based upon his radical version of Islam has oppressed the long-suffering Iranians and vexed the Mideast and West with... Read more
An intriguing religious issue is raised by an odd space-age colloquy in mid-February between Barack Obama and Donald Trump. Out of the blue, political podcaster Brian Tyler Cohen asked Obama, “Are aliens real?” He immediately replied, “They’re real, but I haven’t seen them” and he knows of no proof that extraterrestrials exist. In the ensuing ET-and-thee hubbub, Obama soon clarified his reasoning: “Statistically, the universe is so vast that the odds are good there’s life out there. But the distances... Read more
THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER: This question might seem absurd, since religious birth rituals are so universal. But Christian baptism of infants is being assailed by a prominent (though alienated) Catholic, Mary McAleese, who was the president of Ireland from 1997 to 2011. The headline on a January 11 (paywalled) article she wrote for the Irish Times, the nation’s leading newspaper, announced that “Baptism Denies Babies Their Human Rights.” Infant baptism is a “systemic and overlooked severe restriction on children’s rights... Read more
THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER: Christians’ most beloved prayer occurs in Matthew 6:9-13 as part of Jesus’s “Sermon on the Mount,” perhaps the most memorable speech in human history. (What competitors can you think of?) The New Testament also contains a second, briefer version of the great prayer, in Luke 11:2-4 (on which more below). In Matthew, Jesus tells believers not to pile up many words in praying and offers a simple, concise example. Here is the Matthew wording from the... Read more
THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER: As the complexities in Venezuela continue to evolve, President Donald Trump held his first face-to-face meeting this week with democratic opposition leader Maria Corina Machado. Universal consensus says her party won the 2024 presidential vote by two-thirds or better, whereupon despised dictator Nicolás Maduro, now imprisoned in New York City, stole the office. However, Trump has submerged hopes for eventual elections and is working in tandem with those who ran Maduro’s spurious regime, now led by... Read more
THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER: The Guy is taking a holiday breather and re-posts a classic question from 2015 in the early days of the Patheos Religion Q&A feature. A reader filed the following on behalf of a Prison Fellowship pen pal: “If divinely inspired holy books are for our guidance, benefit, spiritual enlightenment, etc., why is much of it so obscure and beyond the common lay person’s understanding? Where do I draw the line between sticking to what I can... Read more
THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER: How should Christians honor the Virgin Mary’s unique status as the mother of Jesus Christ? How speak of her? What believe about her? Catholics and Protestants have well-known disagreements, but now there’s vigorous debate within Catholicism over the Vatican’s lengthy November “doctrinal note” titled Mater Populi Fidelis (“The Mother of the Faithful People”), which concludes 30 years of discussion on Mary’s role in salvation. See www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_ddf_doc_20251104_mater-populi-fidelis_en.html/ Devotees of Mary sent a last-minute appeal against this new... Read more
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