What happened to slow news weeks right before Christmas?

Busy week for me, and even more so for the religion internets.

The Newsweek cover story on same-sex marriage made a bit of a splash, to say the least. Mollie was predictably unimpressed. Many of her criticisms are spot-on, but I can't quite figure out why she's so pissed that the article focuses specifically on biblical arguments (as opposed to e.g. natural law ones) against same-sex marriage. No, biblicism isn't the whole story here, but it's not exactly a straw man, either. (Had she asked, I'd have been happy to do a Google search for her.) Waldman has a good analysis of the inside-the-media side of the story.

Meanwhile, turns out our United Methodist, Episcopal-worshiping, NE-patrician current president is, horror of horrors, a theologically liberal mainline Protestant. Just another unlikely hero of a cynically waged culture war...good thing his faith was interrogated as fiercely pre-election as the very similar views of the president-elect!

And New-Kind-of-Evangelical® hero Rich Cizik has finally been ousted from his position as head lobbyist for the NAE. A long-sought-after win for the old-line religious right, which, you'll recall, is dead/dying/whatever.

Elsewhere, the old debate between the pro-LGBT-and-abortion-rights religious left and the common-ground-common-good-anti-poverty-etc. religious center-left resurfaced this past week. Yawn.

And here's a really interesting standalone piece: from Sightings, the issue of interfaith work and proselytizing.