Tag: religion

‘Raises serious questions’: White House blasts Episcopal church over refusal to help white refugees

The White House condemned the Episcopal Church on Tuesday after it withdrew from federal refugee resettlement programs in protest when the government asked the church to resettle white refugees from South Africa.

In a Monday letter, a top church leader noted South Africa’s history of Apartheid and said that assisting the refugees cuts against its “steadfast commitment to racial justice and reconciliation.” The Episcopal Church’s government relations arm had touted in 2024 its efforts to help “undocumented immigrants.”

“The Episcopal Church’s decision to terminate its decades-long partnership with the U.S. government over the resettlement of 59 desperate Afrikaner refugees raises serious questions about its supposed commitment to humanitarian aid,” Anna Kelly, a deputy press secretary at the White House, told The Daily Signal. (Afrikaner is an ethnic term to designate white South Africans, who were originally Dutch.)

“Any religious group should support the plight of Afrikaners, who have been terrorized, brutalized, and persecuted by the South African government,” Kelly added. “The Afrikaners have faced unspeakable horrors and are no less deserving of refugee resettlement than the hundreds of thousands of others who were allowed into the United States during the past administration.”

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Episcopal Church Ends Refugee Partnership with U.S. Government — Cites Moral Opposition to Resettling Persecuted White Afrikaners from South Africa

The far-left leadership of the Episcopal Church announced Monday that it is severing its nearly 40-year partnership with the U.S. government to resettle refugees — all because the Trump administration dared to classify white South African Afrikaners as refugees in need of protection.

The same Episcopal Church that prided itself on aiding persecuted people from war-torn regions is now walking away from its commitments simply because the next wave of refugees are white Christian farmers — victims of violent racial targeting in post-apartheid South Africa.

The church claims resettling these families would violate their ‘moral line,’ according to Religion News.

Afrikaner families have been facing widespread violence, including land seizures, farm attacks, and race-based targeting in South Africa — crimes so severe that human rights organizations around the world have raised the alarm for years.

The Presiding Bishop, the Most Rev. Sean W. Rowe, made it clear in a sanctimonious letter that the church would rather burn the bridge with the U.S. government than help what he sees as the ‘wrong’ kind of refugee.

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Greg Abbott Says All Construction Halted for Muslim ‘EPIC City’

Texas Governor Greg Abbott said the state has stopped all construction on “EPIC City,” a proposed Muslim-themed development backed by the East Plano Islamic Center (EPIC).

EPIC officials have repeatedly denied claims that the town would violate state law, or operate under Islamic legal systems. Despite that, the project is under scrutiny from multiple agencies, with Abbott saying the development faces “a half dozen investigations”.

Newsweek contacted the East Plano Islamic Center for a response to the governor’s comments via email.

The Context

The development proposal, dubbed “EPIC City,” covers 402 acres in Collin and Hunt counties. It has drawn backlash from Texas officials, including Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton, who have accused organizers of potential legal violations. Abbott previously wrote in March that “legislators are considering laws to restrict it, as well as laws to prevent foreign adversaries from buying land in Texas.”

What To Know

On Sunday, Abbott said that his office had suspended the construction of EPIC City, which gets its name from the acronym of the East Plano Islamic Center (EPIC).

The governor wrote on X, formerly Twitter: “Texas has halted any construction of EPIC City. There is no construction taking place. The state of Texas has launched about a half dozen investigations into this project. That includes criminal investigations.

“And, the US Department of Justice is also investigating. This matter, and similar matters, are taken very seriously, and actions are being taken to address all concerns.”

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Why did 30 Met officers kick the door down at a teenage tea and biscuits meeting in a Quaker house?

When six young women gathered in central London to discuss the climate crisis and the war in Gaza, the setting could not have been more appropriate. The building in which they sat was a Quaker meeting house, the home of a movement whose centuries-long history is rooted in protest and a commitment to social justice. On the table were cups of jasmine tea, ginger biscuits and a selection of vegan cheese straws.

But the events that brought this apparently convivial gathering to an abrupt end have sparked protests of a different kind and raised questions about how justice is administered by the UK’s largest and most embattled police force.

Talk among the youth activists that evening had turned to the 1963 Children’s March in Birmingham, Alabama, when a flash of blue light interrupted the chatter. Seconds later up to 30 Metropolitan police officers, some armed with stun guns, smashed down the door of the Grade II-listed building and arrested the young women inside.

One of the six, 18-year-old Zahra Ali, was held in a cell for 17 hours. Another was “rear stacked”, hands cuffed behind her back and held against the wall in what she described as an hour-long ordeal. Phones were seized and laptops bagged as evidence.

The raid, described as “intelligence-led”, was targeting the protest group Youth Demand. The members in attendance were arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to cause a public nuisance. Five remain under investigation.

Six weeks on, the operation has drawn criticism from religious groups, politicians and activists. The need for such a severe course of action, meted out in a place of worship, remains a concern, not least for those who were targeted.

“I was the last one to be taken into custody,” said Ali, the youngest of the six women. “I got to the station about 10pm-ish and I had to wait two hours to be booked in. I was taken to a freezing cold cell for hours. I wasn’t allowed a personal call. I didn’t get to speak to my solicitor until he came in person.

“We saw the blue lights a second before they marched in. We were just a bunch of young people talking about our government, about protesting, and they arrested us for that.

“I think had they rung the bell we would have let them in, obviously … They didn’t have to raid us. It’s six young women in a room, in a place that we hired, that we publicly advertised, and they could have just sat in and listened to us. I don’t really see any conspiracy in that.”

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DOJ Launches Investigation Into Planned ‘Sharia City’ with Mega Mosque and Sharia Compliant Schools Near Dallas

The Justice Department on Friday opened an investigation into the planned Sharia City near Dallas, Senator Cornyn said.

Last month Texas Governor Greg Abbott launched a campaign against a planned Islamic “mega-city” outside Dallas.

The East Plano Islamic Center, via its affiliate Community Capitol Partners, is seeking to construct a 1,000-home settlement around 40 minutes from Dallas.

The “Sharia City” would come complete with a mega mosque, Sharia adherent Muslim schools, community college, and sporting facilities.

KHOU reported:

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has opened an investigation into EPIC City, a Muslim-centric development proposed in Collin County, following calls from Sen. John Cornyn, among others, Cornyn announced Friday.

EPIC recently bought just over 400 acres of property north of Josephine near the intersections of County Roads 850 and 695 for the proposed development that includes more than 1,000 homes, a school, retail areas, parks and more centered around a mosque.

Conservative talk radio legend Mark Levin recently discussed the Islamic, Sharia Law compliant city being planned near Dallas and cited The Gateway Pundit’s report.

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Pope Leo XIV ‘looked the other way’ when confronted with child sex abuse allegations against priest in his Chicago church

The newly-elected Pope Leo XIV is facing accusations of ‘looking the other way’ when confronted with child sex abuse allegations against a priests in his Chicago and South American churches, it has emerged.

Robert Prevost, who became the first North American pontiff on Thursday, was accused by a survivors’ group of failing to act upon allegations of abuse in the U.S. and in Peru – concerns they relayed to the cardinals who selected him.

‘Staying silent is a sin. It’s not what God wants us to do. Jesus wants us to stop these things, not make a heathy garden for sexual abuse to grow,’ Lopez de Casas, a victim of clergy abuse and national vice president of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), told DailyMail.com.

Prevost was said to have looked past allegations in Chicago, where he grew up, after Augustinian priest Father James Ray was allowed to live at the St. John Stone Friary in Hyde Park despite having been removed from ministering to the public years prior over accusations of abusing minors.

The new pope allegedly didn’t notify the heads of St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic school, an elementary school half a block from the friary because, the church said at the time, Ray was supposed to be closely monitored in the friary.

Prevost also faced criticism for not having opened a formal church investigation into alleged sexual abuse carried out by two priests in the Diocese of Chiclayo, Peru, which he led from 2014 to 2023. 

SNAP and other groups say they had made the 135 eligible cardinals who selected him well aware of Prevost’s alleged inaction on the allegations.

‘This person will be scrutinized from left to right,’ said Lopez de Casas, who hopes Prevost’s election will shine a brighter light on abuse within the Church.

‘That’s helpful for victims everywhere because we have this pope who will be under the public eye in terms of things he was involved with in the past,’ he said.

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A law that helped convert Indigenous people is now used to get churches near—and on—school grounds

Earlier this year, a small school district just north of Tucson made an unusual decision: It would allow the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to build a complex on public school district grounds where students could be released from class to worship.

But the project quickly unraveled. A few weeks later, the Vail Unified School District reversed course, saying the church canceled the contract after local media reports and secular groups criticized the plan. Still, the construction of religious buildings near schools for the temporary release of students to practice their faith has become a growing concern of church-state separation advocates, who argue it violates legal requirements that keep public schools secular.

In Arizona and several other states, ‘release time’ for religious instruction is not only legal—it’s common.

State law allows students to be excused from school during the day to participate in religious instruction off campus. In the case of LDS students, these classes often include lifestyle lessons. They are typically held in buildings just outside campus boundaries, sometimes only a few hundred feet away.

Religious conservatives have pushed to expand release-time programs nationwide, arguing there is no need to separate religion from daily education. Here, such programs are only growing more popular.

Arizona’s history with religious release time

More than a dozen states currently require school districts to adopt release-time policies.

Most recently, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, signed a bill in February mandating school districts create a release-time policy after two districts rescinded theirs. Previously, Ohio law didn’t require districts to offer the program. The new law, known as the Parents’ Bill of Rights, also bans discussions of sexuality or gender identity before fourth grade.

The Guardian reported that the Arizona-based Alliance Defending Freedom, designated an anti-LGBTQ+ hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, has helped draft model legislation for states to expand release-time programs. This gives parents more authority over their children’s ‘moral and religious’ upbringing, often limiting exposure to diverse communities and families.

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Catholic Church To Excommunicate Priests for Following New US State Law

The Catholic Church has issued a warning to its clergy in Washington state: Any priest who complies with a new law requiring the reporting of child abuse confessions to authorities will be excommunicated.

The new law, which will take effect on July 27, eliminates the long-standing confidentiality of the confessional, forcing Catholic leaders and lawmakers into a highly charged standoff over religious liberty and child protection.

However, the Archdiocese of Seattle and several bishops argue that the law not only contravenes church doctrine but crosses constitutional lines, while supporters maintain it is a crucial step to protect minors from abuse.

Newsweek contacted the Archdiocese of Seattle and Washington Governor Bob Ferguson and the three Democratic state senators who sponsored the bill for comment via email and online inquiry forms.

The issue spotlights the enduring tension between religious freedom and the state’s duty to protect children from abuse. By compelling clergy to breach the confessional seal, Washington joins a small group of states stripping traditional confidentiality protections.

The law has triggered a national conversation about the boundaries of church and state, setting a precedent that could have implications for religious practices and privileged communications nationwide. The outcome may influence how other states approach mandated reporting requirements for clergy, especially as constitutional and civil rights groups enter the debate.

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Bangladeshi Islamists March in Protest at ‘Western’ Laws Guaranteeing Freedom, Equal Rights for Women

Thousands of angry Islamist men marched Saturday across the streets of the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka, to protest against proposals guaranteeing equal rights for women in the Muslim-majority country.

“Men and women can never be equal: the Koran outlines specific codes of life for both genders,” protester Mohammad Shihab Uddin, 53, told AFP. He is leader of a women’s madrassa, a religious school.

“There is no way we can go beyond that.”

AP reports leaders of the Hefazat-e-Islam group said the proposed legal reforms – ensuring a range of freedoms for women – are contradictory to Sharia law and an affront to Islam.

More than 20,000 followers of the group rallied near the Dhaka University, some carrying banners and placards reading “Say no to Western laws on our women, rise up Bangladesh.”

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Sexual abuse of nuns: one of the Catholic Church’s last taboos

Nuns sexually assaulted by priests are one of the last Catholic taboos, but with reports of abuse rising, it is a scandal that will be difficult for the future pope to ignore.

“In the past, the nuns suffered a lot and couldn’t talk about it to anyone; it was like a secret,” Sister Cristina Schorck told AFP, walking through St Peter’s Square with her parents.

The 41-year-old Brazilian, who works with the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians in Rome, said Pope Francis, who died last month, opened “a first door” for women to speak out.

After an unprecedented summit at the Vatican on clerical sexual violence in 2019, a series of measures were taken, including lifting the pontifical secret on abuse and an obligation for people to report cases to their superiors.

“It’s both still a taboo and something that has progressed” because “it’s never been talked about as much as it is today,” Sister Veronique Margron, President of the Conference of Religious of France, told AFP.

The slow shift in attitudes is exemplified by the case of the influential Slovenian priest and mosaics artist Marko Rupnik, accused by nuns of sexual and psychological violence against them in the early 1990s.

It was only under pressure that Francis lifted the statute of limitations in 2023 to open proceedings against him.

Laura Sgro, the Italian lawyer for five of his accusers, told AFP that nuns should be better protected “both by states and by canon law”, notably by extending the statute of limitations, and said the next pope must act “immediately”.

Victims’ associations say the Vatican has not done enough, particularly by refusing to remove confessional secrecy.

“Things are moving forward step by step,” a senior ecclesiastical official told AFP on condition of anonymity, pointing out that Francis “has denounced all forms of abuse”.

Nuns in black, grey, white, beige or brown habits, in Rome to study, work or accompany pilgrims, come and go every day in St Peter’s Square, far from the media hype surrounding the cardinals.

Among them, Sister Marthe, a nun from Cameroon in her forties, said she wanted the Church to “know how” to respond to “sexual (or) power abuse”.

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