The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups and domestic terrorism, in February 2011 released an annual report showing “explosive growth” in the number of active hate groups in the United States and in the number of antigovernment “Patriot” movements. These groups often have a religious element to their agendas.

Read an article about the massacre in Norway in July 2011 by anti-Islamic extremist Anders Behring Breivik, who claimed to be a Christian crusader even as he rejected central Christian beliefs, which highlighted the phenomenon of right-wing violence.

One challenge in writing about the Eastern Orthodox is the debate over numbers. A figure often cited is 3 million adherents in the U.S., with about 2 million in the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, 1 million in the Orthodox Church in America, and some tens of thousands in the other 20 major Eastern Orthodox churches. In a […]

John Hospers is a philosopher, an emeritus professor at the University of Southern California and an editor at Liberty magazine. In 1972, he was the Libertarian Party’s first presidential candidate.

Jack Green Musselman directs the Center for Ethics and Leadership at St. Edward’s University in Austin, Texas. He says he would like to see more media coverage of the way ethical norms and religious values intersect, overlap and reinforce one another (or fail to) as part of the public debate about morality. 

Carolyn M. Warner is associate professor of political science at Arizona State University in Tempe, and her research interests include religion, politics, patronage and corruption. 

Rebecca Konyndyk DeYoung is a philosophy professor at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich. She is an expert on ethics and has written on virtue and vice. She says organized religion has largely bought into the idea of religion as a private matter – something to be practiced at home and in church, but not necessarily […]

David Reidy is an assistant professor of philosophy at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. His research interests include integrity, political and legal philosophy, human rights and public office. 

Anthony V. Alfieri is a law professor at Miami University in Coral Gables, Fla., where he founded and directs the Center for Ethics and Public Service. The center offers ethics training to government agencies.