Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly

"Our argument has been quite simple,” says Rev. Seamus Finn, board chairman of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility. “The more a company is able to integrate a good, solid social and environmental policy and governance policy into their model of business, then they will be around a lot longer."

As the New Year begins, three journalists discuss the top religion stories they will be keeping an eye on in 2016 with guest host and correspondent Fred de Sam Lazaro, who is joined by managing editor Kim Lawton, Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne, and Jerome Socolovsky, editor-in-chief of Religion News Service.

In our final show before the New Year, we review the top religion and ethics stories of 2015. Host Fred de Sam Lazaro is joined by R&E managing editor Kim Lawton, Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne, and Jerome Socolovsky, editor-in-chief of Religion News Service.

"For us it’s very important to hold onto our faith and to do that in a space where it’s encouraged, to engage your intellect but also to remember it goes with your faith, and they are not separate," says Aisha Ibrahim, a student at Zaytuna.

"What we were looking for is an organ that sings, an organ that has a warm, mellow sound that accompanies singing,” says Rev. William Bradley Roberts, professor of church music and director of chapel music at Virginia Theological Seminary.

"I would caution us against thinking that being against one group isn’t going to spill over and hurt many more people," says Dalia Mogahed, a Muslim-American scholar and director of research at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding.

"If we look back in our families, we find that we're all immigrants. Whoever they were, they were the stranger, they were the people who were looked upon as foreigners. For us to turn over and suddenly be prejudiced against some newcomers, this is denying our own heritage."

"With charity people don’t ask, do I get better value for my money by giving to this charity rather than that one? That aspect of market thinking, that I want value for money, is something the effective altruism movement is trying to bring into philanthropy.”

"We'll find as many opportunities as we can to light the menorah because, after all, it's about bringing as much light as we can into our world."

A promising new medical technique known as gene editing—deleting, inserting, or replacing genes in human cells—has the potential to cure many genetic diseases. But ethicist Marcy Darnovsky of the Center for Genetics and Society is concerned about the safety of the technology, the ethical questions it raises, the unintended consequences that may be passed on to future generations, and the possibility of wealthy parents genetically enhancing their children regardless of medical necessity.

Racial diversity is only “one factor among many” in admissions decisions, according to the University of Texas vice president for diversity. But if the Supreme Court decides to abandon racial preferences, what will become of the pursuit of racial justice in education?

"You can only be tough so much,” admits Buffalo Bills icon Jim Kelly. Together he and his wife Jill and their daughters have confronted the death of a terminally ill son and Jim’s struggles with cancer. But “those things we go through that cause us to be tested, or to doubt, or to fear—those things make us stronger in our faith," says Jill Kelly.

Professor Omid Safi, director of Duke University's Islamic Studies Center, says the Paris terror attacks were a “harbinger” of more to come. He urges faith communities to build relationships of trust and begin a global conversation about religion so they can be ready to begin the healing process when the next attack occurs.

Deep in the bayous of south Louisiana, faith-based activists are trying to help vulnerable groups threatened by the consequences of climate change.

“Sea level rises have been measured. They’re verifiable. Climate change is very well documented. The facts are there. You can deny them if you choose to, but we’re seeing the results every day here in south Louisiana, and whether you want to say that’s because of climate change or something else, the effects are very real.”