Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
More Challenges to Decalogue Displays Are Likely A closely divided Supreme Court yesterday issued two decisions on the legality of Ten Commandments displays in public buildings and on public property. The court struck down the Decalogue displays in two Kentucky courthouses but upheld the constitutionality of a Ten Commandments monument on the grounds of the […]
The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life today released an analysis of the recent Supreme Court decision in Cutter v. Wilkinson. The May 31 ruling upheld the constitutionality of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA), a federal law that aims to protect the religious freedom of inmates and others held in […]
Survey Shows Broad Public Support for the Displays, But Differences Exist Across Religious Traditions A closely divided Supreme Court today issued two decisions on the legality of Ten Commandments displays in public buildings and on public property. The court struck down the Decalogue displays in two Kentucky courthouses but upheld the constitutionality of a Ten […]
Church-State Experts React to Unanimous Ruling The Supreme Court yesterday upheld the constitutionality of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA), a federal law that aims to protect the religious freedom of inmates and others held in state and local institutions. The unanimous decision in Cutter v. Wilkinson reverses a ruling by the […]
“Conceptions of the proper relationship between church and state, between religious organizations and government, have been in flux in the United States for many decades,” Stanley Carlson-Thies of the Center for Public Justice argued at a recent public discussion of the faith-based initiative. “There was no long-settled consensus which the Bush administration arbitrarily started to […]
The White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives On February 20, 2001, exactly one month into his administration, President Bush opened the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, a new office within the executive branch dedicated entirely to strengthening and expanding the work of community and faith-based organizations. Now, on the one-year […]
“There’s a proverb that says one generation plants a tree and another gets the shade,” said Jim Towey, director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, reflecting on the office’s first year at an event sponsored by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life Wednesday afternoon. CONTACT Mary SchultzCommunications Manager202.419.4556mschultz@pewresearch.org/pewresearch-org/religion “A […]
JEAN BETHKE ELSHTAIN: We are so pleased to have with us Governor Frank Keating, who is the governor of Oklahoma. He was elected the governor in 1994 just five months before the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. So he has had a baptism of fire on this issue. The Honorable Frank […]
MELISSA ROGERS: Good morning. My name is Melissa Rogers, and I am Executive Director of the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. Welcome to “A Call for Reckoning: Religion and the Death Penalty.” We look forward to a lively and engaging discussion on this important issue. Let me say a special word of thanks […]