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BALTIMORE (RNS) Gay Catholics and victims of clergy sexual abuse are hailing preliminary results of a study commissioned by U.S. Catholic bishops that says gay priests are no more likely than straight clergy to sexually abuse minors. Still, some bishops gathered here for the final day of their semi-annual meeting said it is premature to…

(RNS) Blasphemy. Been there, done that, got the T-shirt. And the T-shirt reads, “Faith is no reason.” The Center for Inquiry (CFI), an international advocacy group based in Amherst, N.Y., picked that brief phrase as the winner of its first-ever blasphemy contest. Contestants were invited to submit slogans of 20 words or fewer that were…

WASHINGTON (RNS) Americans look less favorably on mosques applying for government funding than other religious charities, a new survey shows. While 27 percent of U.S. adults polled oppose religious charities applying for government funding to provide services to the needy, more than half — 52 percent — were against Muslim houses of worship being eligible…

WASHINGTON (RNS) More than one in seven American households found it hard to put enough food on the table last year, according to figures released Monday (Nov. 16) by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. “The recession has made the problem of hunger worse, and it has also made it more visible,” said David Beckmann, president…

JERUSALEM (RNS) Computer chip giant Intel has denied Israeli media reports that it will close its Jerusalem facility unless ultra-Orthodox Jews ease demands that the company shutter its facility during the Jewish Sabbath. “This is not true, we are not threatening anything like that,” Koby Bahar, spokesman for Intel Israel, told Religion News Service on…

(RNS) Almost every pilgrim who makes the Hajj, Islam’s holy pilgrimage to Mecca, brings home an unwelcome souvenir: the common cold. That, however, has never deterred tour operator Emad Elseidy, who has led Hajj pilgrimage groups for about 10 years. The 42-year-old Egyptian immigrant accepts — almost embraces — the possibility of getting sick during…

MOSCOW (RNS/ENI) The election of a woman as head of Germany’s Protestant churches threatens ties with the Russian Orthodox Church, a high-ranking official of the Russian church has warned. Archbishop Hilarion, who oversees external relations for the Russian Orthodox Church, said ties with the Evangelical Church of Germany are threatened by the recent election of…

BALTIMORE (RNS) At a time of fractious debate within the Catholic Church in the U.S., the nation’s top bishop on Monday (Nov. 16) said Catholic universities, media outlets or organizations that insist on independence from the church hierarchy are “less than fully Catholic.” In his address that opened the semi-annual meeting of the U.S. Conference…

(RNS) Reflecting a transitional period for American Jewish leadership, five newcomers top this year’s list of influential Jews published by The Forward, the country’s largest national Jewish weekly newspaper. The Jews crowning this year’s “Forward 50” boast a range of achievements: Jerry Silverman, president of the Jewish Federations of North America; Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren;…

TEXARKANA, Ark. – Evangelist Tony Alamo used his stature as a self-proclaimed prophet to force underage girls into sham marriages with him, controlling his followers with their fears of eternal suffering. But the judge who sentenced Alamo on Friday to 175 years in prison for child sexual abuse warned of another kind of justice awaiting…
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