Nation

We travel back to 1962 to consider the Court’s case on prayer in public schools (including how Word&Way praised the ruling at the time). Then we return to the present to analyze the arguments in Carson v. Makin before peering into the future to consider where this dangerous trip might be taking us.

A film chronicling Martin’s ministry to LGBTQ Catholics — “Building a Bridge,” which was produced by Oscar-winning filmmaker Martin Scorsese and premiered last year at the Tribeca Film Festival — is streaming now on AMC+. This comes as Martin launches an LGBTQ Catholic resource called Outreach, sponsored by America Media.

The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that religious schools can’t be excluded from a Maine program that offers tuition aid for private education, a decision that could ease religious organizations’ access to taxpayer money. The outcome could renew a push for school choice programs in states that have so far not directed taxpayer money to religious education.

We watched our Facebook page erupt on Friday as Jenna Ellis’s followers bombarded us with vitriol, name-calling, and wild conspiracy theories. When someone like Ellis criticizes our reporting, we’re probably doing something right. 

Thousands of clergy, union leaders, activists, and scholars rallied near the U.S. Capitol on Saturday at a march organized by the Poor People’s Campaign, calling on Congress to take action and address the plight of millions of Americans who struggle with poverty and low-income.

Stephen Schneck, a prominent Catholic political activist and academic, has been appointed by President Joe Biden to serve on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, a federal government panel dedicated to protecting religious minorities and other persecuted groups abroad.

In this edition of A Public Witness, we investigate the New York Times’s history of stirring religious conversations. Then we examine the surprisingly narrow perspectives regularly offered in the opinion section of the “old gray lady.”

Sen. Raphael Warnock may have added a title to his name when he was elected to the U.S. Senate last year, but he says he remains first and foremost a preacher. Warnock spoke with Religion News Service about the influence of King on his life, the challenges of being a father to young children from afar, and how he finds sermon topics as he works in Washington.

After Trump lost the election in November, a report from the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty and the Freedom From Religion Foundation concluded that Christian nationalism, also referred to as white Christian nationalism, was used to “bolster, justify and intensify the January 6 attack on the Capitol,” according to BJC’s Amanda Tyler.

A COVID-19 vaccine that could soon win federal approval may offer a boost for the U.S. military: an opportunity to get shots into some of the thousands of service members who have refused other coronavirus vaccines for religious reasons.