Religion and Belief

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      Chad Kimball Sues ‘Come From Away’ Over His Termination

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      The actor, who is Christian, said in an interview he was let go because of his religious beliefs. The show’s producers declined to comment.A former lead actor in the musical “Come From Away” has sued the show’s producers, claiming that he was let go from the production because of his Christian beliefs.Chad Kimball, 45, a Tony-nominated performer who had been with the show since before its transfer to Broadway in 2017, filed suit this week in New York State Supreme Court, alleging that the production had violated his rights under New York City’s Human Rights Law.In the lawsuit, which was first reported by The New York Post, Kimball claimed he was terminated “wholly or partly” because of his religious beliefs. According to the lawsuit, one of the show’s producers allegedly told him there were concerns about supposed connections between his faith and Christian conservatives connected with the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol.Matt Polk, a spokesman for the show, which reopened on Sept. 21, said the producers declined to comment.Kimball, a Broadway veteran described in the lawsuit as “a devout and practicing Christian,” had stirred controversy in November 2020 when he announced on Twitter that he would “respectfully disobey” Washington State’s coronavirus-related restrictions on religious services, including rules forbidding even masked worshipers from singing. At the time, he was living in Seattle, his hometown.“Respectfully, I will never allow a Governor, or anyone, to stop me from SINGING, let alone sing in worship to my God,” Kimball, who had previously had Covid-19, wrote.That statement drew strong criticism from some in the theater industry, including a co-star, Sharon Wheatley, who responded, “I respectfully totally and completely disagree with you.”Kimball said in an interview Friday that it was hurtful to have the initial reaction to his social media posts subsequently “snowball” into discussion of him as a “conservative Christian” whose beliefs were somehow connected with the Jan. 6 insurrection, which he described as “an event I wasn’t even involved with.”“I don’t talk about politics at all,” he said. “The only thing they really know about me for sure is that I’m a Christian.”Before the social media exchanges, the lawsuit said, Kimball, who had appeared in more than 1,000 performances of the show before the shutdown in March 2020, had never received any reprimand or complaint, and had never been told by anyone connected with the show that he “made them feel unsafe.” But subsequently, he “was forced to explain and defend his Nov. 15, 2020, tweet to Defendants’ agents and employees,” the suit claims.Then, on Jan. 18, the suit said, he was contacted by a producer, Susan Frost, who allegedly informed him that there was conversation around his “conservative Christian” faith and his “freedom to believe.”Frost, the suit claims, also mentioned the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection and said that there were concerns that “the events at the Capitol, Josh Hawley and the conservative Christian movement were tied together and implied a connection” between Kimball’s faith and the “ideas and actions” of that day.On Jan. 22, according to the lawsuit, Frost told Kimball he would not be invited back to the production, which he was told “needed to focus on bringing the show back together and ensure people’s safety.”At the suggestion of Frost, the suit said, he spoke with the show’s director, Christopher Ashley, on Feb. 2, and asked him if he had been let go because of disagreements with colleagues or his religious beliefs. “In response,” the lawsuit continues, Ashley “stated that it was ‘everything.’”As a result, according to the lawsuit, Kimball was “made to suffer significant economic and professional harm,” as well as “emotional and physical pain and suffering.” The lawsuit is seeking compensatory and punitive damages and lost wages, as well as legal costs.Kimball was nominated for a Tony Award in 2010 for his role in the musical “Memphis.” While he has always been a Christian, the lawsuit said, it was following his recovery from an injury while in the show that he started becoming “more outspoken regarding his beliefs.”In the interview, a joint one with his lawyer, Lawrence Spasojevich of the firm Aidala, Bertuna & Kamins, Kimball said he had an inkling that his position with the show might be in jeopardy as early as December 2020 when he contacted the show’s producers to inform them of the tweets and the reaction to them.Kimball, who said he was currently not working, added that negative reactions to his beliefs weren’t new to him. “What was new to me was the idea that a religious belief could be used as fodder for deciding I wasn’t worthy of being a part of the show,” he said. More

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      Bob Abernethy, Longtime Host of PBS Show on Religion, Dies at 93

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      He conceived and produced “Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly” and was its face for 20 years, after four decades as an NBC News correspondent.Bob Abernethy, who capped a four-decade career as an NBC News correspondent by injecting religion, one of the most under-covered subjects on television, into national programming with a weekly series that ran for 20 years on PBS, died on May 2 in Brunswick, Maine. He was 93.His death, at a heath care facility, was confirmed by his daughter Jane Montgomery Abernethy. The cause was Alzheimer’s dementia.The grandson of a Baptist minister in Washington whose congregation included President Warren G. Harding and Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes, Mr. Abernethy had retired from NBC in 1994 after covering the collapse of the Soviet Union, the nascent space program and Congress.He was not ready to stop working, though. Armed with his deep faith, intellectual curiosity and a theology degree he had earned from Yale Divinity School during a one-year leave of absence in 1984, he persuaded WNET, the PBS station in New York, to produce “Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly,” a half-hour nonsectarian series that Mr. Abernethy hosted and presided over as executive editor beginning in 1997.Within 10 years of its launch, the show — which Mr. Abernethy had described as “a news program, no preaching” — was airing on 250 public stations nationwide, winning some 200 industry awards. He and his collaborators went on to broadcast regularly until 2017, when he was 89.With the journalist William Bole, Mr. Abernethy edited “The Life of Meaning: Reflections on Faith, Doubt, and Repairing the World,” (2007), an anthology of interview transcripts from the PBS program.“Nothing I have done has been as personally satisfying as founding and working on” the program, he wrote in the introduction to the book, adding, “The main reason for that is the many opportunities the show provides for sitting down with the likes of Archbishop Desmond Tutu — extraordinary men and women who speak as naturally about their faith and doubt and spiritual practices as they do about the weather.”Mr. Abernethy in an undated photo. He persuaded PBS to produce “Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly,” becoming its host and executive producer.David HollowayOther guests included the Dalai Lama, President Jimmy Carter, the Rev. Billy Graham and Jonathan Sacks, at the time the chief rabbi of the United Kingdom.The series covered a wide range of topics, including atheism, abortion, assisted suicide, sexual abuse by clergy and organ transplants.“Finding this line between sensitivity to the spiritual dimensions of a story on the one hand and objective, traditional skepticism is a constant struggle and a very appropriate one, but I think we’ve got it right,” Mr. Abernethy told The Washington Post in 2000. “This is a matter of good reporting. Unless you get the spiritual element of the story, you’re missing something very important. It’s like interviewing Babe Ruth and not asking about hitting.”When “Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly” was approaching the end of its run, Jerome Socolovsky, the editor in chief of Religion News Service, was rueful, telling the news service Current in 2016, “The media landscape will miss this crucial provider of video stories about religion that didn’t favor one or the other but gave viewers a full perspective on religious news developments.”Robert Gordon Abernethy was born on Nov. 5, 1927, in Geneva to Robert and Lois May (Jones) Abernethy. His father worked for the Y.M.C.A.’s international newspaper. After Bob was born, the couple returned to the United States. His father began to teach religion at the Hill School in Pottstown, Pa., but died of complications of appendicitis in 1930.Bob and his mother moved in with his paternal grandparents in Washington, where his grandfather was senior minister of Calvary Baptist Church. She taught piano at the National Cathedral School.After graduating from the Hill School, he enrolled in Princeton University but interrupted his studies to serve with the American occupying Army in postwar Japan, where he hosted a program for Armed Forces Radio. Returning to college, he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from what is now the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs.Coming from a family of pastors, he felt “a certain amount of pressure on me to become a minister, too,” he told the website Resources for Christianity in 2013, “but I never heard a call.”Mr. Abernethy married Jean Montgomery in 1951; she died in 1980. In addition to their daughter, Jane, he is survived by his second wife, Marie (Grove) Abernethy, whom he married in 1984; their daughter, Elizabeth C. Abernethy; and four children from Ms. Abernethy’s first marriage. He had homes in Brunswick as well as in Washington and Jaffrey, N.H.Mr. Abernethy was a member of the United Church of Christ. His wife is a member of the Russian Orthodox Church.He joined NBC News after receiving his master’s from Princeton in 1952. Early on he wrote and hosted “Update,” a program for young people, and was later a Washington interviewer for the “Today” show. He anchored the evening news for KNBC in Los Angeles among other assignments.One posting was to Moscow, after he had completed his leave from NBC News to study theology in 1984. Before he left, he recalled: “I ran into a guy I had known who asked me, ‘What’s new?’ I said, ‘I took a year’s leave from NBC and went to divinity school. I got married and we had a baby. What’s new with you?’”He never stopped working. At his death, he was hoping to document the lives of homeless people through video interviews, for a future broadcast. More

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      Director of Amazon's 'Tandav' Cuts Scenes After Pressure From India's Hindu Nationalists

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyDirector of Amazon India Drama Cuts Scenes Amid Outcry From Hindu NationalistsFaced with boycotts and criminal complaints, the director of “Tandav” made the edits this week. But that did not appear to satisfy some of the show’s critics, who called for him to be jailed.Supporters of India’s governing Bharatiya Janata Party demonstrated against the Amazon series “Tandav” on Monday in Mumbai.Credit…Indranil Mukherjee/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesSuhasini Raj and Jan. 22, 2021Updated 2:20 p.m. ETARPORA, India — The director of a big-budget Amazon web series has bowed to pressure from Hindu nationalists and cut several scenes that they had deemed offensive, demonstrating the sway of a powerful political movement that strives to reshape Indian society.Ali Abbas Zafar, the director of “Tandav,” a gritty political drama, made the edits amid an intensifying outcry about the show and calls for a boycott.Hindu nationalists, including members of the governing Bharatiya Janata Party, or B.J.P., have accused Mr. Zafar of insulting Hindu deities and stirring up animosity between Hindus and Muslims and between upper castes and lower castes.Mr. Zafar said on Twitter on Tuesday that the show’s cast and crew had decided to “implement changes to address the concerns raised,” and since then, several scenes have been excised. But on Friday, some critics continued to drum up opposition, calling for Mr. Zafar to be put in jail.Officials at Amazon Prime declined to comment.The creators of “Tandav” have been caught up in the sweeping political and social changes in India driven by a Hindu nationalist movement. Led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has shouldered aside significant opposition, the movement champions India as a Hindu nation that pushes other groups, including its significant Muslim minority, to the margins.The pressure has extended into culture. In recent years, Hindu nationalists have heavily criticized Bollywood, the central Indian filmmaking industry, for depictions that run counter to their beliefs.Among the cuts made to “Tandav” was a scene in which a university student is seen playing a cursing Lord Shiva, a Hindu god, on a stage. In another scene that was taken out, a fictionalized prime minister speaks derisively to a member of a lower caste.But on Friday, Ram Kadam, a B.J.P. state lawmaker who had filed a criminal complaint against the show’s creators, said the edits were not enough.“This is a fight against the type of people who hurt the religious sentiments of Hindus,” he said. “They must go behind bars.”At least three criminal complaints have been filed, including one that accuses the show of promoting hatred between different religions, a serious crime in India. Already investigators in Uttar Pradesh State, run by one of Mr. Modi’s closest allies, have summoned Mr. Zafar to speak to them.But the true reason for the complaints against “Tandav” may be that the show holds up a mirror uncomfortably close to Indian society and some of the problems blamed on Mr. Modi’s administration. In the opening episode, the show features protesting students and disgruntled farmers, echoing events that have taken place in recent months. (Mr. Zafar has said the show is a work of fiction.)”Tandav” is just one of many recent productions that have provoked the ire of Hindu nationalists. A journalist filed a criminal complaint this week against the makers of “Mirzapur,” another Amazon web series and the name of a midsize town in northern India. The journalist said the series hurt religious and regional sentiments and defamed the town.In recent months, similar pressure has been exerted on Netflix. Several of the platform’s productions have come under attack, including a show that featured a Hindu woman kissing a Muslim man, with a Hindu temple in the backdrop, which Hindus denounced as offensive to their beliefs. Hindu nationalists have tried to shut down interfaith marriages, and recent laws in several of India’s states have targeted interfaith couples.Gaurav Tiwari, an official in the youth wing of the B.J.P. who has filed a complaint against Netflix officials, said the government needed to protect the public from what he described as vulgar and anti-Hindu content. “People have been murdered for cartoons in other religions, and look at what is happening with ours,” Mr. Tiwari said. “If this continues unabated, what will the future generations of Hindus look back on when they see movies like these?”Mr. Tiwari called for the strictest form of punishments against Netflix and Amazon, including banning them from India for a few years.Entertainment industry analysts said the restrictive environment meant that many filmmakers were now shying away from subjects that touched on religion or politics.“This is exactly what this government wants,” said Ankur Pathak, a former entertainment editor at Huffington Post India. “It’s very clear this kind of bullying of streaming platforms is a broader ideological project of the B.J.P. to wipe out any kind of ideological or political critique.”“The internet is the only free form of medium which exists against the present political regime,” he added. “And that makes them very anxious.”Suhasini Raj reported from Arpora, and Jeffrey Gettleman from New Delhi.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More