by Ebony A. UtleyR3 Contributor The 2012 BET Awards were black people on their best behavior. Rappers bragging about their God flow. Gospel singers praising Jesus. Comedians joking about getting their sermons from rappers. Honorees urging the audience to wait on God. BET took its audiences to the church and the club last night. And both visits were business as usual. The BET Awards celebrate black culture. Black culture has always embraced the sacred along with the secular. That’s not... Read more

Is Barack Obama a Christian? This perennial question came to the fore recently after American President Barack Obama endorsed same-sex marriage in an interview with ABC’s Robin Roberts. Speaking of his views on the issue as the result of “an evolution,” Obama relayed that he had decided that it was “important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same-sex couples should be able to get married.” Referencing the ethical witness of his daughters, the President made his... Read more

The 2012 campaign has placed evangelicals in a paradox. A recent PRRI/RNS poll reveals that white evangelicals support a Mormon presidential candidate over Obama by an overwhelming 49% margin, but are simultaneously the religious group most likely to say it is important for a presidential candidate to share their religious beliefs (67%). While there are plenty of legitimate policy reasons that evangelicals might support Governor Romney, their willingness to overlook their desire for a coreligionist candidate may also have at... Read more

The Supreme Court upheld the Affordable Care Act, but the fight for healthcare is not over. The GOP now has a rallying cry to drive its base to the polls. Evangelical Christians and conservative Catholics make up a large portion of the Republican base. As a Christian political theologian, I cannot help but see their opposition to “Obamacare” as an act of hypocrisy. Maybe that is putting it too strongly. For the record, I think this hypocrisy is accidental. It... Read more

When the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops kicked off their “Fortnight for Freedom” campaign almost two weeks ago, they chose an auspicious feast day to start. On the Church’s liturgical calendar, June 21 commemorates two martyrs who suffered political persecution: St. Thomas More and St. John Fisher, who were killed under Henry VIII for refusing to recognize him as the head of the Church of England. The American bishops have indicated they feel similarly besieged by political forces. To promote... Read more

As candidates and campaigns reach out to people of faith, and religious organizations join the fray over hot topics like the recognition of same-sex marriage in civil law and federal requirements regarding contraception coverage, Americans are once again asking questions about the rules governing religious expression in public life. To provide Americans with some answers to these questions, a group of national Muslim, Jewish, Sikh and Christian leaders from the evangelical, mainline and Catholic traditions joined with civil liberties leaders... Read more

The Supreme Court’s decision to leave President Obama’s health care reform legislation mostly intact swings the conversation back toward the presidential race, where Obama can claim an undisputed victory that will energize his supporters. But Romney may also benefit, because the ruling could galvanize two powerful, overlapping groups in the GOP base: members of the Tea Party and white non-Hispanic evangelical Protestants. In the reactions to the ruling, the powerful way that racial identity shapes attitudes toward the health care... Read more

By Rashad GroveR3 Contributor Revolutionary intellectual and feminist scholar Angela Davis once said, “Diversity means absolutely nothing if those who are “diverse” do nothing except to cause the machinery of the current system to run exactly the same way or even more effectively.” In lieu of the recent historical nomination of the Rev. Fred Luter as the first African-American president of the largest protestant denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, this analysis has the potential to play out in our current... Read more

Molly Worthen’s NYT essay on the social cleavage between white and black evangelicals is a statement of the obvious and a work of art. Worthen teaches history at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill and her writing reflects a deep understanding of evangelicals black and white. The term “evangelical”, in its common usage, refers exclusively to white folks. This may be the best explanation for a curious fact: only 35% of Americans in a recent Barna poll correctly identified... Read more

His silence about his faith notwithstanding, Mitt Romney will become the first Mormon to win a major-party presidential nomination. That could put more attention on his religion than any candidate has faced since John Kennedy in 1960, especially as Romney tries to attract skeptical evangelical voters. Meanwhile, President Obama’s endorsement of gay marriage and the ongoing social issues surrounding the war on women are bound to intensify criticism from the religious right and the crucial faction of conservative Latino voters.... Read more