The God Issue at the New Scientist

The New Scientist magazine has released a special issue of articles devoted to the scientific study of religion--see here. The articles address many questions such as do people have to be indoctrinated to believe in God (no, it appears children are born primed to see God in the world around them) and is religion necessary for morality (no, but it helps). Warning: some of the articles are gated online.

2012 USCIRF Annual Report Released

The USCIRF released its annual report yesterday. The full report can be found here. As usual, they suggest as "countries of particular concern" (CPCs) those countries with particularly egregious religious freedom violations. The countries identified as CPCs this year are Burma, North Korea, Egypt, Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Pakistan, China, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam.

This year there is some controversy about whether Turkey should have been on this list, see this post at Religion Clause.