Harvard University is suing the Trump administration over its accusations that the Ivy League school has failed to keep Jewish students safe by allowing antisemitism to flourish. But over the past few months, the university has quietly gutted a Harvard Divinity School program that its own antisemitism investigation found was critical of Israel and may have been biased against Jewish students. (Shimron, Religion News Service)
Read MorePope Leo XIV has appointed a new president for the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy for Life, a bioethics think tank that Catholic conservatives criticized under Pope Francis for departing from official church teaching on issues such as contraception and euthanasia. (Giangravé, Religion News Service)
Read MoreA 2025 poll of American evangelicals conducted by Lifeway Research, a publishing arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, reveals a complicated picture of evangelicals’ views on immigration. Many told pollsters they see the number of immigrants as a drain on resources (44%), and the vast majority support immigration reform (80%) and stronger borders (90%). (Bacallao, Religion News Service)
Read MoreWomen had served as deacons in the early church, but the church restricted the ministry to only men during the Medieval period. Over the centuries, the idea of permanent deacons fell away and became a transitional step in the process of men becoming priests. (DeRose, NPR)
Read MoreA proposed amendment to the Southern Baptist Convention’s constitution, which would have kept any church that affirms, appoints or employs a woman “as a pastor of any kind” from belonging to the SBC, got 60.74% of the vote Wednesday (June 11), just shy of the two-thirds majority needed to move forward. A similar proposal failed last year on a second vote. (Smietana, Religion News Service)
Read MoreThe overwhelming sentiment is: Sure, cigarettes are bad for you, but they make you look good — as evidenced by Lucy, who keeps her smokes in an elegant silver case, perhaps to emphasize how sleek the habit is, and brandishes them to show just how effortlessly hot she can look bringing one to her lips. (Zuckerman, The New York Times)
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