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Tuesday, May 20: 1% Think God is Female, Shroud of Turin Riddle, Michigan Contraception Mandate

May 20th, 2008 · No Comments

There are a couple of interesting Christian news articles today. The first touches on a survey of British adults asking whether God is male or female. The second article discusses the Shroud of Turin and how contamination may have resulted in incorrect carbon dating results in the late 80s. The final article is about proposed Michigan legislation that would mandate paying for contraception, if employers offered prescription drug coverage. Let’s get to the links…

A survey of 1,050 adults in Britain reports that 62% believe God is male, and 1% believe God is female.

The survey was commissioned by the Movement for Reform Judaism in Britain to coincide with its launch of its new daily and Sabbath prayer book, or Siddur.

For more results, including how many think religions discriminate on grounds of gender, read I believe… God is man.


 

John Jackson, a physics lecturer at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, is resurrecting the mystery of the Shroud of Turin.

Radiocarbon dating in the late 80s determined the shroud, which many believed was the burial cloth of Jesus, was a fake.

Jackson, however, has indicated there could be the possibility that

even minimal contamination of the shroud by environmental carbon monoxide could have skewed the dating by 1,300 years — making it not medieval but contemporaneous with Jesus’s life.

Is more testing in the works? Read Springs prof revives shroud riddle


 

Introduced legislation in Michigan would mandate employers who provide prescription drug coverage to pay for contraception.

Paul A. Long, the Michigan Catholic Conference vice president for public policy said,

“This legislation would impose a mandate upon Catholic religious institutions to provide contraceptive insurance coverage, coercing essential ministries of the Catholic Church under the color of law to act contrary to one of the church’s most profound religious teachings on matters of morality and social justice.”

An argument is that religious organizations can avoid contraceptive coverage by not offering prescription drug coverage.

“As a matter of justice, Catholic institutions consider it a religious duty to provide (prescription drug) coverage,” Long said. “How is the health and welfare of employees better off if there is no prescription drug coverage?”

For the full details of this story, read Assault on religious freedom seen in Michigan contraception mandate.

That’s all for today! See you tomorrow.

Tags: Christian News Summaries · Christian Surveys · Featured