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One measure, an executive order from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, jeopardizes foster care licenses for anyone who takes in unaccompanied immigrant children who arrive in the country without authorization. The other, a bill being fast-tracked through the state legislature, would bar state and local governments from contracting with businesses that knowingly transport undocumented immigrants, including bus companies or airlines.
Photo courtesy Tania Fernandes Anderson.
Tania Fernandes Anderson, Boston’s newly elected councilor, embraces struggle.
In November, she made history as Boston’s first Muslim, first African immigrant, and first formerly undocumented person to be elected to the city council. Now, with an ambitious slate of policy goals, she hopes to transform the city she calls home. While politics brings a new set of challenges for Anderson, her struggle doesn’t take place at city hall. Rather, her struggle is spiritual.
The flag of East Turkestan and the Uyghur people. Credit: Sachelle Babbar/ZUMA Wire/Alamy
As the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing wound to a close in a ceremony of flags, fireworks, and an LED screen designed to look like ice, one Seattle-area church marked the end of the international games with a very different kind of event: a meal and listening session with members of the Uyghur community in and around Edmonds, Wa.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott delivered the keynote address at the Texas Values policy forum at the Great Hills Baptist Church in Austin, Texas on Sept. 24, 2021.
“Obviously this order is actually going to cause more harm,” said Rev. Gavin Rogers, associate minister at Travis Park Church in San Antonio. Rogers said characterization gender-affirming care as “child abuse” flies in the face of research, which has shown its importance in the health and wellbeing of transgender youth, who already face many barriers to access.
A woman places flowers outside the Ukrainian embassy in Moscow after Russia launched a massive military operation against Ukraine. February 24, 2022. REUTERS/Evgenia Novozhenina
The Vatican, in its first comment on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine that began on Thursday, said it hoped that those who hold the destiny of the world in their hands would have a “glimmer of conscience.”
A woman holds a sign outside the Glynn County Courthouse in Brunswick, Ga., on Nov. 24, 2021 after the jury reached a guilty verdict in the trial of the men charged with the February 2020 death of 25-year-old Ahmaud Arbery. REUTERS/Marco Bello/File Photo
The three white men convicted of chasing down and murdering a young Black man, Ahmaud Arbery, as he was out jogging in their suburban Georgia community, were found guilty on Tuesday of committing federal hate crimes and other offenses in the 2020 killing.
Original photo of Cedric J. Robinson by Doc Searls via Flickr. Graphic by Candace Sanders and Mitchell Atencio/Sojourners.
The term, “Black radical tradition” was coined in 1983 by Cedric J. Robinson, a professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Robinson saw the tradition as encompassing a host of movements — from antebellum rebellions against slave owners, to pan-Africanism, and Black Power. He defined the tradition as, “the continuing development of a collective consciousness informed by the historical struggles for liberation” in his book Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition.
Screenshot from Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker’s testimony before the House Committee on Homeland Security. Cytron-Walker — who led the Texas synagogue hostages to safety last month — told Congress there is a need for increased funding for the Nonprofit Security Grant Program.
The rabbi who led hostages to safety during an attack on his Texas synagogue last month said federally funded security training “gave [him] the courage to act.” Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker urged Congress to increase federal funding for a program that would help other religious leaders prepare for such assaults.
Voorhees High School Library via the North Hunterdon-Voorhees Regional High School District.
Over the course of three school board meetings in the months that followed, parents argued that the books’ sexual content constituted “pornographic” material that didn’t belong in schools. Many parents cited their Christian values and rights as reasons why they spoke out against the books.
Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI arrives at the airport for his return flight to the Vatican. Pope Benedict on Tuesday asked victims of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church for forgiveness but rejected allegations that he was involved in any cover-up. Reuters
Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI on Tuesday asked victims of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church for forgiveness but rejected allegations that he was involved in any cover-up. The retired pontiff was responding to an independent report, released on January 20, which chronicles decades of alleged abuse and misconduct in the archdiocese of Munich, which he led as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger from 1977 and 1982.
Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich S.J., Archbishop of Luxembourg, (in mask) greets Pope Francis at the opening of the Synodal Path at the Vatican Oct. 9, 2021. Vatican Media/Handout via REUTERS
A prominent liberal cardinal who leads a body representing European bishops has called for “fundamental revision” in Catholic teaching on homosexuality, and said it is wrong to fire Church workers for being LGBTQ.
CODEPINK marches with the peace tank during the Deadline for Democracy protest at the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 6, 2021. For this event, a number of social justice organization in the Washington, D.C., area collaborated to shut down access to the Capitol as a means of pressuring Congress to act on key pieces of the Democratic agenda. (Photo by Allison Bailey/NurPhoto)
In the letter, the scholars criticize the budget being set $25 billion higher than President Joe Biden had requested. They write that the country urgently needs to “shift our security and foreign policy strategy” to break cycles of violence, cultivate peace, and practice constructive conflict.
The Catholic priest Franco Mella talks to the media before delivering a letter addressed to Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam, calling on authorities to drop charges against media mogul Jimmy Lai and other political activists jailed or in custody under the national security law, outside the government headquarters in Hong Kong, China, Jan. 31, 2022. REUTERS/James Pomfret
A coalition of Catholics and other Christians on Monday called on Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam to drop charges against media tycoon Jimmy Lai and other political activists jailed or in custody under a China-imposed national security law.
Brian Houston at the Hillsong Conference live at The O2 Arena, worshippers attend the evangelical megachurch event in London, United Kingdom. Via Alamy.
Hillsong Church founder Brian Houston said on Sunday he is stepping down from all ministry responsibilities to prepare to “vigorously defend” against Australian police charges that he concealed sex abuse of a young man in the 1970s.
In August, the 67-year-old Houston was charged with concealing child sex abuse by his late father, Frank Houston, an allegation he strenuously denied.
A general view of the Supreme Court building in Washington, D.C., Nov. 26, 2021. REUTERS/Will Dunham
Scholars say the court’s 6-3 conservative majority has shown an eagerness to impact abortion, affirmative action, LGBTQ rights, and more.
Pope Francis holds the weekly general audience at the Vatican on Jan. 26, 2022. REUTERS/Remo Casilli
Pope Francis said on Wednesday that parents of LGBTQ children should not condemn them but offer them support. He spoke in unscripted comments at his weekly audience in reference to difficulties that parents can face in raising offspring.
Security measures adopted by Congregation Beth Israel in Houston have included installing surveillance cameras outside its premises. Credit: Briana Vargas for The Texas Tribune
On Jan. 15, a gunman held four hostages in a standoff that lasted around 11 hours at Colleyville’s Congregation Beth Israel, a synagogue northeast of Fort Worth not affiliated with Kutner’s. The FBI said Friday it is considering the incident a terrorist act and hate crime.
Former pope Benedict gestures at the Munich Airport before his departure to Rome on June 22, 2020. Sven Hoppe/Pool via REUTERS
Former Pope Benedict XVI acknowledged on Monday he had been at a 1980 meeting over a sexual abuse case when he was archbishop of Munich, saying he mistakenly told German investigators he was not there.
Attendees hold up a sign reading “I Am the Post-Roe Generation,” ahead of the March for Life in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 21, 2022. Annie Klingenberg for Sojourners.
Since 1974, anti-abortion activists have gathered each January in Washington, D.C., to protest the abortion rights granted under Roe v. Wade in January of 1973. With the Supreme Court set to issue a major ruling on abortion rights later this year that could overturn the ’73 ruling, attendees are hoping this will be the last annual anti-abortion march while Roe is the law of the land.
Pope Benedict XVI finishes his last general audience in St Peter's Square at the Vatican Feb. 27, 2013. REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi/File Photo
Former Pope Benedict XVI failed to take action against clerics in four cases of alleged sexual abuse in his archdiocese when he was archbishop of Munich, a report found on Thursday.