If you follow the popular polls, you might think that Americans are growing ever more skeptical about man-made climate change — despite the consensus among published climate scientists. That’s simply not true, Jon Krosnick of Stanford University told an audience of social scientists and cognitive researchers Wednesday, in Garrison, N.Y. He maintained that most Americans [...]

“One prays for the preservation of the state, since if, God forbid, it doesn’t remain, then chaos breaks loose, or even worse, the Kingdom of God! That would be the worst thing that could happen.” -Jacob Taubes Theology is always political, whether radical or supporting the status-quo. This past week, I read through Jacob Taubes’ [...]

This update is purely a #humblebrag, but Sunday evening Jack Caputo spoke at Claremont. His lecture on radical theology covered three questions: 1) What is radical theology? (or theology after Hegel) 2) Does God exist? (No… or perhaps) 3) What does it mean to pray to a God that doesn’t exist? Afterwards, a few of [...]

Today’s is a guest post from my friend Samuel Kooistra. Sam is currently finishing law school and recently accepted a position as executive director with Arkansas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. A few months back, he contacted me regarding research into how apocalyptic beliefs among American Protestants (specifically apropos of the rapture, tribulation, Left [...]

From the LA Times: A federal appeals court Tuesday struck down California’s ban on same-sex marriage, clearing the way for the U.S. Supreme Court to rule on gay marriage as early as next year. The 2-1 decision by a panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals found that Proposition 8, the 2008 ballot [...]

At the Centre for Inquiry London, Kenan Malik discusses the changing nature of taboos against blasphemy in his talk “Beyond the Sacred.” Until the abolition of the offence in 2008, blasphemy was committed in British law if there was published ‘any writing concerning God or Christ, the Christian religion, the Bible, or some sacred subject [...]

If you are a fan of Continental philosophy’s most important philosopher of religion, the one and only John Caputo, you will want to be at Claremont this coming Sunday (2/12/12) for an  evening of philosophy and cabernet. And if you feel the need to catch up on “some sweet theological cat nip for theology nerds,” [...]

10:09am. Cobb “so I’m very much against religion, but I’m even more against secularizing.” Whoa. He’s going after escapism and “those who want only to preserve the previous generation’s patterns of behavior” 10:03am. Cobb is moving on to a critique of economy. Capitalism has made economy an unqualified “good,” removing it from critique. Chief value [...]

Night ended with a round of Homebrewed Christianity live with Tripp Fuller, Bo Sanders, Doug Pagitt, and others 4:41pm Clayton: “all knowledge claims are situated; they come from a particular place” He takes this and moves into a polemic against purely post-structural theology. He makes a good observation (nobody dies for claims that they know [...]

Recently New Jersey Governor Chris Christie made the surprising and positive move of nominating Bruce Harris, an openly gay African American, to the state’s all white Supreme Court. It’s specially surprising given his status as a Tea party favorite who was courted to run for the 2012 GOP nomination. Marriage equality advocates took it as [...]