News

Yale Divinity School is launching a new Center for Public Theology and Public Policy, an advocacy-focused body to be led by pastor Rev. William Barber II. Barber has emerged as a prominent activist over the past decade, launching several major protest movements that have attracted attention from liberal leaders.

Christmas is normally peak season for tourism in Bethlehem, located in the Israeli-occupied West Bank just a few miles southeast of Jerusalem. In pre-pandemic times, thousands of pilgrims and tourists from around the world came to celebrate.

The Vatican has defrocked an anti-abortion U.S. priest, Frank Pavone, for what it said were “blasphemous communications on social media” as well as “persistent disobedience” of his bishop. 

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott seeks to investigate organizations that he claims have assisted with “illegal border crossings” along the U.S.-Mexico border, raising religious liberty concerns among faith-based groups and religious organizers helping migrants with medical needs and shelter.

The Council of Centers on Jewish-Christian Relations has asked Christians to evaluate their own theologies and teachings for anti-Jewish sentiments. Much of Christian preaching today acknowledges a Jewish Jesus born into an expressly Jewish context, but also implicitly paints a portrait of a Jesus whose arrival made Judaism obsolete.

Pope Francis called Wednesday for a “humble” Christmas this year, with savings from reduced spending on gifts donated to help the “suffering people of Ukraine.” Francis called for “concrete gestures” of charity for Ukrainians this holiday season during his weekly general audience.

In October, Christian Churches Together, an ecumenical group of Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox Christians, gathered for its annual forum to address a topic that has plagued the church and society beyond it: polarization.

Catholic Church of Our Lady of the Rosary sits in a “religious complex” housing other Christian denominations. And at this church in Qatar, the small Gulf emirate hosting the World Cup, there are some tweaks to tradition.

In this edition of A Public Witness, we explore some of the complexities that have emerged from the fire that gutted Middle Collegiate Church. To what degree should historic preservation laws limit what churches can do with their buildings?

Professor Marcia Pally makes the case that in nations descended from Abrahamic traditions like the U.S., religion is not somehow conservative and anti-democratic while secularism is progressive and pro-democracy. Abrahamic principles are at the core of democracy.