News
RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
For the first time in its history, the U.S. Supreme Court is hearing oral arguments by teleconference on certain cases, including a number on religious liberty.
ANTI-RELIGIOUS PROPAGANDA
For the second time in less than three months, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation—Radio-Canada—has engaged in biased, antireligious reporting in violation of its mandate to honestly inform and enlighten the Canadian people, and in the midst of a global pandemic.
COMBATING BIGOTRY & HATE
We stand with religions and ministers across the world urging a unified, peaceful response to the horrific injustice of George Floyd’s death. In its wake, we work to pick up the pieces and build something better. The world has seen enough hate, division, blind prejudice and discrimination. Those days must end.
RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
For the first time, Religions for Peace USA organized a National Interfaith Prayer Service for Healing & Hope via Facebook and Zoom.
RELIGIOUS LITERACY
The numbers are most telling among those who consider themselves religious, with 56 percent of those affiliated with historically black Protestant churches saying their faith has been strengthened by the pandemic, followed by 42 percent of evangelicals. Catholics and Protestants follow at 27 percent and 22 percent respectively.
RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
In 1654, the first Jews arrived in New Amsterdam (present day New York City). Commemorating more than 350 years since that first landing, President George W. Bush proclaimed May 2006 the first annual Jewish-American Heritage Month.
TOLERANCE
As the numbers of hate crimes, and other expressions of intolerance and bigotry continue to rise, and as actions once considered unacceptable have increasingly become the norm a ray of light surfaces each year at the fourth month of the calendar: Celebrate Diversity Month.
TOLERANCE
“Let us renew our faith in one another and draw strength from the good that is gathering in troubled times as communities of diverse faiths and ethical traditions unite to care for one another. Together, we can and will defeat this virus—with cooperation, solidarity, and faith in our common humanity.”
TOLERANCE
This year’s Holocaust Day marks the 75th anniversaries of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp, the end of the Holocaust and the end of World War II. Recent polling from the Pew Research Center, however, shows a lack of knowledge amongst Americans on the basic facts of the Holocaust and of Adolf Hitler’s rise to power. Out of 13,000 polled, fewer than half correctly answered multiple choice questions about those subjects.
TOLERANCE
In an iconic show of unity and brotherhood, a Muslim and a Jew, paramedic partners in Israel, paused during one particularly busy day to pray—the Muslim kneeling on his prayer rug facing Mecca; the Jew donning his prayer shawl, facing Jerusalem. The photo, snapped by a coworker, garnered thousands of likes within hours. One twitter user wrote: “One fight! One victory! Let's unite.”
