David Sloane

David Sloane is an intern for the SSRC project on New Directions in the Study of Prayer. He will graduate from the University of Virginia in May 2012 with a B.A. in Religious Studies.

Posts by David Sloane:

Tuesday, May 22nd, 2012

Buddhist manuscript to be released in book form

BBC News reported recently on the release of a collection of rare fifth-century Buddhist manuscripts, known together as the Lotus Sutra, in book form in India.

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Wednesday, May 9th, 2012

Backlash against Muslims?

At The Atlantic, Conor Friedersdorf attempts to prove wrong writers, political commentators, and politicians who claim that post-9/11 Islamophobia is a media-conceived, unsubstantiated hoax.

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Thursday, May 3rd, 2012

United Methodist Church, Israel, and divestment

Today at The New York TimesLaurie Goodstein reports on the United Methodist Church’s decision not to divest from companies that supply Israel with equipment used to enforce its control in the occupied Palestinian territories.

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Tuesday, May 1st, 2012

Evangelicals support Romney

At The New Republic, Eg Kilgore explains why the Christian Right will overcome its apprehensions about Mitt Romney’s religion.

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Wednesday, April 25th, 2012

Problems with new Gallup poll?

Gallup’s latest poll, released today, breaks down presidential candidate support by voter religiosity and religious identity.

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Tuesday, April 24th, 2012

War on nuns

At The Nation, Norman Birnbaum, professor emeritus at Georgetown University Law Center, rebukes the Catholic Church for its historical “unyielding insistence on the rule of men”; and more specifically, for its decision to reorganize the Leadership Council of Women Religious, an umbrella organization that represents eighty percent of American nuns.

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Tuesday, April 24th, 2012

Religion and civic engagement in Europe

British think tank Demos has recently released a new report, written by Jonathan Birdwell and Mark Littler, entitled “Faithful Citizens.” The report investigates “the different relationship between religion and politics in the UK and Europe.”

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Tuesday, April 17th, 2012

Why religious studies?

On April 18th, Columbia University’s Institute for Religion, Culture, and Public Life will host Nathan Schneider for a talk on “Why the World Needs Religious Studies (and Why Religious Studies Needs the World).”

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Tuesday, April 17th, 2012

Modern Mormons and socialism

At Salon, Troy Williams retells an old Mormon tale and chastises likely Republican candidate for president, Mitt Romney, for abandoning his religion’s socialist roots

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Thursday, April 12th, 2012

On the secularist-Islamist divide

At Al Jazeera EnglishElizabeth Shakman Hurd gives an abridged history of the past half-century of Tunisian politics, and relays the Enahddan notion that the revolution in Tunisia is neither unambiguously Islamist nor secularist.

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