For the last decade, Patheos, a multifaith media platform that hosts commentary from writers of different religions and the religiously unaffiliated, has been going in a concerning direction. According to departing bloggers and their manager, Dale McGowan, the nonreligious channel has been steered away from criticizing religion.
The annual National Public Opinion Reference Survey (NPORS) of the Pew Research Center said around three out of ten US adults now consider themselves unaffiliated to any religion. First conducted in 2020, NPORS is an annual survey conducted online and via mail using a nationally representative group of respondents.
On Monday, December 6, Jen Psaki, White House Press Secretary, announced that the US government had imposed a diplomatic boycott on Beijing. Psaki said, "the Biden Administration will not send any diplomatic or official representation to the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics and paralympic games."
The Harvard Graduate Student Union ratified the changes to a four-year contract, adding caste as a protected category. The new provisions of the contract will pave the way for caste-sensitive policies and projects affecting close to five thousand student-workers in Harvard.
A Shiite Muslim from Tyre, Lebanon, posed as a Jewish man and married a Jewish woman from Brooklyn, New York. Eliyah Hawila, a 23-year old Lebanese whose real name is Ali Hassan Hawila, was born and raised as a Muslim, with no Jewish heritage.
On Friday, November 26, Minnesota Democratic House Representative Ilhan Omar called for house leaders in both aisles to take action against Colorado Republican House Representative Lauren Boebert. Over the holidays, Rep. Boebert made incendiary statements where she likened Rep. Omar to a suicide bomber.
A survey published by the Pew Research Center (PRC) on November 23 showed that most US adults don’t blame God for bad things happening, but rather people and society are to blame.
Conducted between September 20 to 26, the survey polled 6,485 U.S. adults online through the American Trends Panel (ATP). The ATP consists of more than 10 thousand adults located in the U.S. and is selected randomly to create a nationally representative sample.
On Wednesday, November 24, a controversial painting of Jesus and Mary was stolen. The painting "Mama" shows a black Mary cradling the body of Jesus after his crucifixion, similar to Michaelangelo's Pieta sculpture. The painting was placed outside the Mary Mirror of Justice Chapel in the Catholic University of America (CAU) Columbus Law School.
