Hear Kathryn Joyce, The Revealer’s former managing editor, talk about personhood bills, the Quiverfull movement, and the patriarchy movement here, on Tulsa public radio.

Nicole Neroulias writes at The Scoop that despite common reporting, same sex marriage is about a lot more than religion.

Yesterday the USCCB spelled out exactly why they are opposed to the Obama administration’s provision of birth control to all insured women without a copay.  The Church would strongly prefer to tell employers and employees, at least the ones that answer to Catholic leadership, how to manage their reproductive rights.  If the issue were just money (no Catholic money used to “subsidize” contraceptives), the compromise that Obama and Sebelius struck with insurance companies–that companies will provide contraception to individuals directly, without implicating the employer–would satisfy the USCCB.  It doesn’t.  Which reminds me, will Kathleen Sebelius still give the graduation speech at Georgetown University?

The Economist follows up on a May 6th New York Times feature about “The Life of Jesus Christ,” a play performed by the inmates of Angola prison in Louisiana, with an article of its own.  The New York Times used the title, “In Prison, Play With Trial at Its Heart Resonates,” The Economist, “Enacting forgiveness and redemption.”  Both remind me of the brilliant piece by Liliana Segura at Colorlines last year, “Dispatch From Angola: Faith-Based Slavery in a Louisiana Prison.”

Becky Garrison on the political positions played by media, voters, advocates and the president on Amendment One.

Jim Davis on the death of a predatory priest. Amy Levin on liberalism and feminism. The Immanent Frame’s fantastic “Politics of Religious Freedom” series. Catholics roll up their sleeves over a Wendell Berry lecture. Hasidic Jews trying to stay out of court. Rowan Williams on the blood market.

…the Catholic Church seems to find “radical feminist” ideology.  Even if the gatherers are cookie-hawking tweens.  And members of a non-Catholic organization.  Not affiliated with the Church in any way.

To the ever broadening category of Catholic Church vs. Women, we add today’s entry:  the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has formalized it’s disapproval of the Girl Scouts of the USA with an official inquiry.  It’s hard to not giggle at the USCCB following up its harassment of the women religious with the tweens with badges, but there you have the church’s priorities clearly demonstrated.

The Washington Post, via an AP article by David Crary, quotes Girl Scouts’ spokewoman Michelle Tompskins:

“For us, there’s an overarching sadness to it,” Tompkins added. “We’re just trying to further girls’ leadership.”

Exactly.

Read more on the Girl Scout inquiry here, and here.

Becky Garrison: A Gallup poll released on May 20, 2011 states that for the first time a majority (53%) of Americans believes same-sex marriage should be recognized by the law as valid, with the same rights as traditional marriages. Also, an April, 2012 survey by the Pew Research Center showed that for the first time there is as much strong support as strong opposition to gay marriage – 22 percent each.

Ashley Baxstrom: The Huffington Post announced on Friday that its very own Arianna Huffington – the Post’s namesake? Editor? Aggregator General? Blogger in Chief? – will interview the Dalai Lama on May 14^th.

His Holiness will be awarded the prestigious Templeton prize, which “honors a living person who has made an exceptional contribution to affirming life’s spiritual dimension.” When he heard he would be receiving the award, he responded that he was just a simple Buddhist monk.

Huffington will sit down with him at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London the day of the award for a one-hour interview, and has asked the Post’s readers for topic suggestions. “If you had an hour with the Dalai Lama how would you use it?” the story asks.

I’m three weeks down, one to go.  Serving justice in Brooklyn has kept me quiet, but here’s what I’m reading between testimonials:

Jane Iwamura at The Scoop on Tupac’s undead appearance at Coachella.

One wonders if Mark Oppenheimer just didn’t have any critical thinking to apply to his recent review of Ross Douthat’s new book, Bad Religion, or if the NYT editors just sliced it right out for the sake of their home-base columnist.  (Regardless, I send a shout-out to one beat man who knows what real bad religion means, Pete Finestone.  Hey Stone, wanna write a review for us?  Word.)

Ahem!  Mennonites are exploring their “martyr complex,” a trait “many Mennonites carry—especially ethnic German and Swiss Mennonites—and the consequences of that mindset.”

Remember when Sojourners backed away from the gays?  Becky Garrison does.  It was a true grit moment, one the “faith in action for social justice” magazine sadly failed to pass, a turning point in our desire to like Sojourners for all their ramble, an end to our guilt for never really getting Jim Wallis’ swagger.

New crits on the religion chopping block.  Religion & Politics launched this week.

The Grand Mufti of the Republic of Tatarstan recounts his version of the past year.

Church artwork is moving to where the devout are; from Europe to Latin America, Africa and Asia.

What do atheist billboards do?

Fredrick Clarkson writes at Women’s ENews about the latest doings of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice.

…most residents of Trivandrum had not been clamoring for the temple’s vaults to be searched. This had initially puzzeled me. In America…it’s inconceivable that a mysterious, locked door would be left alone. (Recall Geraldo Rivera breaking into Al Capone’s vault, in the nineteen-eighties). But in India the wealth stored in the vaults of Hindu temples is viewed in largely spiritual, not monetary, terms…

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…Men and women will carry back to their small villages and towns tales of the Grand Mosque’s splendor, which is the reward sought by every Muslim ruler who alters the mosque…

The New Yorker has been cleaning up in the religion-writing sweepstakes these past few weeks, particularly with two pieces that raise fascinating questions about wealth, expenditure and the preservation—or radical renovation—of sacred sites. If you missed them, it’s worth circling back. The pieces, read together, amount to a tale of two temples and the ripple effects of altering their physical and natural environments. 

In a statement on their website and a follow-up video released on April 5^th, IC elaborates on the background behind the Kony story and encourages everyone to explore inhumane conditions throughout the world. To this end, they devised a worldwide day of action titled “Cover the Night (Make Kony Famous 2012).

Amy Levin: Given that today and tomorrow mark two extremely important national holidays in Israel beginning with Yom Hazikaron, the day of remembrance for Israeli soldiers, followed by Yom HaAtzmaut, Israel’s independence day, it seems fitting to bring the timeless debate over Zionism to the virtual table. This week, Huffpost Religion is publishing daily columns as part of a series called “Liberal Zionists Speak Out.”