Last month, when strikers from Southern California arrived in Bentonville, Arkansas to protest Wal-Mart’s labor practices with reggae beats, pots and pans, and a Latin American-inflected protest culture, it became clear to onlookers that America’s superstore was no longer the small family business that Sam Walton had founded and grown in the cradle of the anti-labor culture of Southern evangelicaldom. But it’s also become clear that Wal-Mart’s own ambitions to become a global empire—expanding beyond southern suburbs to new regions,... Read more

As you may have noticed, a flurry of articles and blog posts have materialized in the wake of the Episcopal Church USA General Convention, many asserting that the Episcopal Church’s declining numbers, and those of other Mainline Protestant churches, are direct result of their progressive policies. The most notable of these responses came from Ross Douthat of the New York Times who asked, “Can Liberal Christianity Be Saved?” “Instead of attracting a younger, more open-minded demographic with these changes,” Douthat... Read more

The day after the election, Southern Baptist Seminary President Albert Mohler said, “I think this was an evangelical disaster.” Not really. But it was a disaster for the religious right, which had again tied its faith to the partisan political agenda of the Republican Party — which did lose the election. But Nov. 6 was an even deeper disaster for the religious right’s leaders, because they will no longer be able to control or easily co-opt the meaning of the term... Read more

It’s been a sobering few decades for Christians who work alongside the poor, claim their feminism, respect scientific discovery, care for the earth, and yearn for marriage equality. We felt like the voice of Christianity had been captured by some strange ventriloquist, and it was proclaiming things that often contradicted our faith. We became frustrated with our own irrelevance, as our speech in the public square seemed to be on permanent mute. And yet, we worked alongside the poor, remembering... Read more

We have heard the soaring phrases often. They are fixed in the American book of verse. Now, they sound again in Steven Spielberg’s magnificent film, “Lincoln.” They come to us as tones of faith from Abraham Lincoln’s presidential speeches: “a firm reliance on Him who has never yet forsaken this favored land,” “the Almighty has his own purposes,” “that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom,” and “the judgments of the Lord are true.” They suggest... Read more

by Elizabeth Desnoyers-ColasR3 BloggerIn class rooms all over the country educators like me yearn for their students to grasp and lay hold of the empirical nuggets entrenched in our daily academic lectures. Through trial and a little error, I have ultimately learned this integral process is not as straightforward as it seems.  During a typical 15-week period of academic interactive engagement, I provide these charges with an intellectually tempting smorgasbord of the most cerebrally tantalizing fruits of my Africana Studies/... Read more

Dr. Elizabeth F. Desnoyers-Colas is an Assistant Professor of Communication at Armstrong Atlantic State University, in Savannah Georgia. She is currently the Coordinator of Armstrong’s African American Studies minor. Her areas of research interests include African American preaching, storytelling and narrative, African American women’s role in the military, and examining the rhetoric of rap music performed by African American women.   Dr. Desnoyers-Colas is a retired U.S. Air Force Major who spent her distinguished 15 year career as a Public Affairs... Read more

Last week, Democrat Tulsi Gabbard became the first Hindu-American to enter the U.S. House of Representatives after she soundly defeated Kawika Crowley of the Republican Party in Hawaii’s second Congressional district.The 31-year-old will be making history yet again when she takes her oath of office. According to The Hill, Gabbard, an Iraq war veteran, will be taking her oath over the Hindu holy scripture Bhagavad Gita, instead of the Bible. Gabbard, whose first name refers to a tree sacred to Hindus, follows the... Read more

I was no great fan of Mitt Romney’s, as I think I’ve already made quite clear.  I didn’t like him.  I didn’t vote for him.  I’m glad he lost. However, as much fun  as it has been to watch people dance around the post-election bonfire of Sheldon Adelson’s money, I actually have something good to say about Romney’s abortive attempt at the White House.  There was something about his candidacy specifically that gives me a little hope that America is getting... Read more

It is far past time to separate the conservative movement in this country from it’s fanatical marriage to religion, to once and for all put to bed the idea that all conservatives are Christian and that to be a conservative one must be a very religious person. This is complete balderdash. Recent surveys have put the number of nonreligious Americans at 20%, or one-fifth of the population. That’s right: one out of every five Americans does not have a religious affiliation. That’s... Read more