Faith in the news: Trump Campaign Courts Catholics
And John Kasich recognizes the moment...
Faith in the news, week of 7 April 2020
I’ll try to write on this constituency in the coming weeks, but I wanted to flag for you something that Elana Schor over at AP has caught on to recently: Catholics for Trump is well underway. It is crucial that Dems think about their outreach strategy as well.
Meanwhile, as we all well know, this week is Easter and Passover. It’ll be so interesting to see how Christians and Jewish people around the world, and their leaders, deal with the virtual nature of this year’s observance. And Julie Zauzmer has chronicled how one family is putting together a virtual Seder, and it’s lovely. (WaPo)
This rumination on worship during a pandemic is also lovely from our friend, Tish Harrison Warren. (NYT)
NIH Director Francis Collins, an evangelical, is using his status and access to encourage faith leaders to follow social distancing directives. Hashtag believe in Jesus, but science has an important role to play too. (WaPo)
You’ve probably been hearing lots of chatter online about the “end times” and Elizabeth Diaz has explored this recent uptick in more depth. (NYT)
MuslimGirl.com founder, Amani Al-Khatahtbeh, is going to run for Congress in NJ, making her the first Muslim woman to run in the state. (Yahoo News)
The Supreme Court said this week that it would not hear a case from the Catholic church that challenges Washington, DC’s metro service (WMATA) ban on religious advertisements. (The Hill)
ICYMI, the AND Campaign has launched an initiative to help churches in low-income neighborhoods seek $3,000 grants. RNS has covered the new initiative, Churches Helping Churches.
Finally, I (Michael) was struck by this essay from John Kasich in USA Today. It is the kind of thing I called for in my essay a couple weeks ago. It really should not take a politician to recognize what is called for in this moment. Perhaps I am missing it, but it seems to me that previous generations of Christian leaders would have viewed this as a moment for evangelism, for invitation. Yet, I see mostly insular responses. Pastors operating as leaders of organizations, not spokespeople for Christ. Am I just missing it? Are we so scared of public disapproval that we won’t even gingerly approach the topic of the state of people’s souls? Have we become so accustomed to distraction that we no longer know what to do with people’s attention?
We decided to make Faith in the News available to everyone this week. Subscribers receive this content, and more, every week.
Image is of a drive-up service held by Pastor Greg Locke in the parking lot of the Global Vision Bible Church in Tennessee. Image credit: Brett Carlsen/Getty.