Sightings
Items by or about Trinity Forum Fellows, Moderators, and other friends
Cromartie Edits New Book on Religion and Politics in America
Tue 31 May 2005 by TTF Staff
Senior Fellow Michael Cromartie has edited a new book of essays on religion and politics in the U.S., with particular focus on the role of journalists.
The book is titled, appropriately enough, Religion and Politics in America: A Conversation.
The current national discourse has brought faith and its relationship to public policy to the forefront of our daily news. Since 1999, the Ethics and Public Center, through the generosity of the Pew Charitable Trusts, has hosted six conferences for national journalists to help raise the level of their reporting by increasing their understanding of religion, religious communities, and the religious convictions that inform the political activity of devout believers. This book contains the presentations and conversations that grew out of those conferences.
Cromartie’s introduction is available here. We hope this contributes to better understanding of this critical issue.
Loconte on Religious Freedom in the Middle East
Tue 31 May 2005 by Peter Edman
TF Moderator Joseph Loconte has an article out in the 28 May 2005 issue of The Weekly Standard, “The Unmentionable Freedom: A new report on reform in the Arab world ignores religious liberty.”
[M]ost Islamic leaders and institutions--and now the scholars of the Arab Human Development Report--seem to have sworn an oath of silence about the problem of religious oppression, especially the plight of Muslims who challenge state orthodoxy on religious grounds. The lack of religious liberty prevents debate over the meaning of Islamic texts--a crucial step in offering a progressive interpretation of Islam. For all the talk of a "freedom deficit," the authors of the U.N. report fail to recognize the unique status of religious expression. They thus see no connection between the denial of religious rights and the political and economic stagnation of most of the world's 22 Arab states. Their two previous reports, which examined economic and educational issues, were similarly silent on the point.
The full text is for Standard subscribers only, but I will send a text version to interested Trinity Forum alumni .
