Mark Movsesian

Even casual observers know that Orthodox Churches traditionally have close ties with the state. So many in the West don’t know what to make of the fact that, in the current conflict in Ukraine, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church appears to be siding with the protesters. The  New York Times , . . . . Continue Reading »

When I heard the rumors this fall, I have to confess, I dismissed them. And maybe it is only political posturing. But leading Turkish officials are actually talking about converting the famed Hagia Sophia in Istanbul back into a mosque. The Hagia Sophia, or Church of the Holy Wisdom, was built by . . . . Continue Reading »

[caption id=”” align=”alignnone” width=”480”] Indian Schoolchildren Doing Yoga ( NYT ) [/caption] Last summer, I wrote about a constitutional challenge to  yoga classes in California public schools . When a school district near San Diego added yoga to its . . . . Continue Reading »

Just in time for the Christmas Wars, the  Journal of Catholic Legal Studies  has published papers from a symposium on state-sponsored religious displays that the Center for Law and Religion co-sponsored with our our sister school, the Libera Universita Maria SS Assunta (LUMSA), in Rome . . . . Continue Reading »

In the blogging world, what follows is known as a “bleg”: As some First Things readers know, in my day job, I’m the Director of the Center for Law and Religion at St. John’s University in New York. The Center has its own blog, the Center for Law and Religion Forum , which . . . . Continue Reading »

At the  Center for Law and Religion Forum today, we have a podcast on the legislative prayer case just argued at the Supreme Court,  Town of Greece v. Galloway . The podcast will be particularly useful for students and others interested in the history of legislative prayer and an . . . . Continue Reading »

Here’s what looks to be the final update on that interview Pope Francis gave to Eugenio Scalfari of the Italian newspaper  La Repubblica  this fall. Readers of  this website  will recall that the interview quotes Pope Francis as saying, among other things, that . . . . Continue Reading »

The annual conference on Christian Legal Thought, co-sponsored by the Lumen Christi Institute and the Law Professors Christian Fellowship, will take place in New York next year on January 3. This year’s theme is the work of the late Jean Bethke Elshtain. Details, including a link for . . . . Continue Reading »

At the Center for Law and Religion Forum , my colleague Marc DeGirolami has a rundown of the various appellate court rulings to date in the ACA Contraceptives Mandate litigation, including last week’s Seventh Circuit decision. Check it out . . . . . Continue Reading »

At Mirror of Justice, my friend Rick Garnett has  an interesting post  about Guy Fawkes Day, which, for those of you who don’t know, was yesterday. The day commemorates the foiling of the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, a conspiracy by British Catholics to blow up Parliament and end the . . . . Continue Reading »