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California’s battle to define marriage as between a man and a woman is getting personal and nasty — especially for Mormons on both sides of the political debate. Opponents of Proposition 8, a ballot measure to thwart gay marriage, have picketed LDS services in Northern California and threatened to protest outside the Oakland LDS Temple.…

Washington – Six in 10 Americans think the U.S. is “uniquely blessed” by God, but a higher percentage — almost eight in 10 — think the country sometimes does more harm than good when it relates to the rest of the world, according to a new study on religion and America’s role in the world.…

Washington – The U.S. Justice Department recently disclosed a 2007 ruling by its Office of Legal Counsel that permitted the relief agency World Vision to keep a $1.5 million grant despite its policy of hiring only Christians. World Vision successfully sought an exemption from a statute that requires grant recipients to refrain from hiring discrimination…

Washington – The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum on Wednesday renewed its push for the Vatican to open its archives for Europe’s Holocaust period, saying it would allow historical conclusions to be based on fact and not rhetoric. The call comes amid growing controversy over plans by the Vatican to beatify Pope Pius XII, a…

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (RNS) Roman Catholics in North America and Britain are calling for a series of YouTube videos showing a Canadian teenager destroying Communion hosts to be removed from the Internet. The Quebec teenager named Dominique, who tags himself “fsmdude,” has posted more than 40 videos featuring him desecrating the host, the small circular…

DENVER – Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin describes herself as a “hard-core pro-lifer” and expresses confidence that in spite of disheartening polls, “putting this in God’s hands, that the right thing for America will be done at the end of the day on Nov. 4.” In an interview with evangelical leader James Dobson that…

(UNDATED) “It took Jesus a thousand years to die. Images of his corpse did not appear in churches until the tenth century.” Those are the provocative opening sentences of the new book, “Saving Paradise: How Christianity Traded Love of This World for Crucifixion and Empire” (Beacon Press), by Protestant scholars Rita Nakashima Brock and Rebecca…

Lori Lipman Brown has had her fill of God-talk. “It’s a very frustrating time,” said Brown, director of the Washington-based Secular Coalition for America, the first lobbying organization devoted to secular issues. “All of us have been very hopeful that at the end of the Bush administration, we would stop seeing theology impose itself on…

More than eight in 10 white Americans would vote for a racial minority for president, but fewer whites who take the Bible literally or who worship in an all-white congregation would do the same, according to a recent survey. Research from Baylor University’s Institute for Studies of Religion found that 84 percent of non-Hispanic white…

Pastor Jim Garlow is fasting and praying at his megachurch in La Mesa, Calif., to encourage fellow California evangelicals to vote for Proposition 8, which would amend the state constitution to ban same-sex marriage. Jan Garbosky, meanwhile, married her lesbian partner of 20 years on Oct. 4 at their Unitarian Universalist church in San Diego…

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