The rise of Christianity in China; 2014 Supreme Court Roundup; Probe lands on comet...more

Is It Another Great Awakening?
Economist editors John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge shocked the secular West in 2009 by announcing that God Is Back—starting with China, of all places. Here were two epitomes of British reasonableness explaining that Europe was the modern exception in viewing God as dead, an irrational shadow of the past, with its Continent declining in population and power, and the rest of the world resembling America in having religion as a part of their cultural dynamism.

China’s atheistic communist government conceded that its Christian population had doubled to 21 million over the past decade, worshiping in 55,000 official Protestant and 4,600 Catholic churches. The underground church, it’s widely known, was much larger—by foreign estimates perhaps 77 million, which means larger than the Communist Party. A Pew Global Attitudes study found only 11 percent of Chinese saying religion was not important in their lives, compared to 31 percent saying it was very or somewhat important. Indeed, everywhere the authors looked outside their European homeland, religion was booming in the early 21st century world.

Six in 10 Americans today tell Pew pollsters that religion plays a very important role in their lives. Over 80 percent believe in God or some higher power, with only four percent choosing agnosticism and merely two percent atheism. Only eight percent said they did not pray, as against 73 percent who said they prayed at least weekly, while 83 percent said God answered prayers. Sixty-three percent said they belonged to a church. The most recent Pew poll reflected some changes, with a plurality agreeing that gays had a right to marry, but a majority also thinking that homosexuality was sinful. Seventy-two percent agreed religion was “losing influence” in America but 56 percent of these thought that this was a bad thing...

The rise of Christianity in China
As he stood in the hot sun and watched a dozen earth movers smash through the walls of the Sanjiang church, Mr Dai felt a great sadness and also fear – for himself and for the future of his fellow Christians. “There were so many police blocking the road and surrounding mountains. They had cut off power to the whole area and blacked out mobile phone coverage and they were trying to stop anybody coming near,” he says.

By pretending to be part of the demolition crew, Dai managed to get through the outer cordon of riot police and huddle with a small group of believers on a hillside watching the massive building collapse under the onslaught. “Words can’t express how traumatic it was,” says the devout Christian, who had travelled from another parish to join members of the congregation trying to protect the church. “I just kept thinking of Jesus’s words – ‘They know not what they do’ – they don’t realise it but they will surely be judged by God.”...

First Things: 2014 Supreme Court Roundup
...It is a parlous state of affairs when we must depend on the Supreme Court as the bulwark of our most vital natural rights and civil liberties—freedom of religion, freedom of expression and group association, freedom of conscience, the rights to live, to work, and to raise a family. The Court has not always, or even very often, done well on this score. With distressing frequency, it has performed poorly, shortchanging rights plainly written in the Constitution and inventing illegitimate ones nowhere to be found in the text. The Court tends to bow to political pressure and blow with prevailing cultural and popular winds.

Measured by the low standards of the desperate, the Supreme Court’s 2013–14 term was on the whole a spectacularly good one. The term was, if anything, a relief. In the cases that really mattered, the Court reached the right results and gave support to the rights of dissenters, albeit with more equivocation and labor than one might have preferred. The opinions typically were not sweeping, beautiful landmarks. But at least they were not the cataclysms that we have so often come to dread, and see...

Maryland school district to strip references to religious holidays on school calendars

Germany’s Pay to Pray Scheme
...Read the whole thing.  If I were a German Catholic or Protestant, I would be enormously offended by this whole thing. It’s outrageous that if you are a German Catholic who wants to go to confession, the priest will deny it if you haven’t paid the church tax. How is this much different from Johann Tetzel’s indulgence business, selling salvation to Renaissance German Catholics? For that matter, how is this significantly different from simony?...

9 Things You Should Know About Military Chaplains
1. Chaplains have the rank of a military commissioned officer and serve the dual roles of religious leader and staff officer, but do not possess the duties or responsibilities of command. Article 24 of the Geneva Convention identifies chaplains as protected personnel in their function and capacity as ministers of religion. Service regulations further prohibit chaplains from bearing arms and classify chaplains as noncombatants...

Rosetta Probe Touches Down On Speeding Comet
...Scientists cheered and punched the air in the European Space (ESA) control room when they received confirmation that the Philae lander was sending signals from the comet.

ESA Director-General Jean-Jacques Dordain told a delighted audience: "This is a big step for human civilisation."

Staff at the Lander Control Center 300 million miles away in Cologne said information they were receiving suggested the probe had made a "soft, gentle" landing...

Mormon Leaders Admit Church Founder Joseph Smith Practiced Polygamy ...The essay does not provide a definite number of wives that Smith had, but research Todd Compton said that his studies have determined Smith had was married to at least 33 women. Compton also believes that 10 of his wives were under the age of 20 at the time of marriage; one woman, Helen Mar Kimball was 14 when she married Smith...