Word: secularization
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...their stride and accept the horrors of a lame-duck Bush administration. Then again, in many other countries stolen or rigged elections can trigger riots—though that is unlikely to do much, even if people do have the right to bear assault rifles again. No, the secular and sensible will probably just have to grin and bear the following four years much as they did the last four and hope that the Democratic party will get its act together...
...religious upbringing, embodied the tough outsider of New Zealand literature, starting with John Mulgan's 1939 novel Man Alone. When Gee began writing the book in the late '60s, "we were able to shake off that oppressive Puritanism," the author, 73, recalls, "which wasn't only religious, it was secular." Novels like Gee's award-winning Plumb (1978), based on the life of his Presbyterian minister turned Communist grandfather James Chapple, continued that shaking-off. By the time writer-director Brad McGann got around to adapting Den three decades later, New Zealand had changed...
...closed doors, he is seen as a man who makes no mistakes." But during Saddam's reign of terror, Sistani's seclusion turned into house arrest imposed by the regime. He endured it as a "religious duty to defend the Shi'ites' sacred center," says Tawfiq al-Yassery, a secular Shi'ite politician with close ties to the ayatullah. After Saddam fell, Sistani faced new threats from al-Sadr's militia, and now armed guards tightly control access to his house. He is still most comfortable operating behind closed doors; he hasn't conducted Friday prayers for years and even...
...citizens to ask Americans, "When are you leaving Iraq?" He advised people against revenge killings of Baathists. Iraqi and U.S. officials agree that his calming influence was critical in tamping down Shi'ite resistance. "That was the only reason there was no bloodbath in those early days," says a secular Iraqi politician. When the orgy of looting after Saddam's departure ran unchecked, Sistani stood up to label it immoral and wrong. Overnight, thieves were piling up stolen air conditioners, computers, art and relics at the doors of Shi'ite mosques...
...ayatullah has indicated he disapproves of the unified slate. "He's afraid the way the voting is being set up, the Shi'ites might be cheated out of their majority," says Michigan's Cole. The system has also encouraged the curious alliance of the religious al-Sadr and the secular Ahmad Chalabi, former U.S. favorite, who see in each other a way to trump Sistani's power. The ayatullah is agitating for changes that would give Islamic parties aligned with him a higher profile. While the cleric has not tried to negotiate the specifics, observers say that...