Plug-In: Does requiring a mail guy to work Sundays violate his religious freedom?

Surprise! I mentioned earlier that I’d be on an international reporting trip and unable to produce today’s Plug-in.

Alas, I ran into a visa issue, so here I am. So, today’s news includes:

• Muslims celebrating the Eid al-Fitr holiday amid joy and tragedy, via The Associated Press’ Abby Sewell.

• Conservative Anglican leaders calling for a break with the Archbishop of Canterbury over same-sex blessings, via the Wall Street Journal’s Francis X. Rocca.

• An Iowa GOP event this weekend that represents a key test of former President Donald Trump’s hold on the U.S. religious right, via the Washington Times’ Seth McLaughlin.

That’s just the start of this week’s best reads and top headlines in the world of faith.

Let’s keep rolling!

What To Know: The Big Story

High court seeks compromise: The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday reviewed “the case of a part-time mail carrier who quit his U.S. Postal Service job after he was forced to deliver packages on Sundays, when he observes the Sabbath.”

A majority of justices “expressed interest … in a compromise intended to balance religious rights in the workplace with the burden they might impose on employers and co-workers,” the Washington Post’s Ann E. Marimow reports.

CNN’s Ariane de Vogue explains:

A lower court had ruled against the worker, Gerald Groff, holding that his request would cause an “undue burden” on the USPS and lead to low morale at the workplace when other employees had to pick up his shifts.

Not just Christians: Conservative Christians aren’t the only ones asking for accommodation in the mailman case, Religion News Service’s Yonat Shimron notes.

“Religious minorities — Jews, Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Seventh-day Adventists — have filed briefs asking the Supreme Court to overturn a ruling that gutted a civil rights statute’s protections for religious accommodation,” Shimron’s story points out.

Important context: The Washington Times’ Mark A. Kellner recently interviewed Larry Hardison, whose “name was chiseled into American legal history 46 years ago when the Supreme Court ruled against him in a landmark religious accommodation case.”

For more insight, see “A brief history of American Christians fighting Sunday mail” by Christianity Today’s Daniel Silliman.

Here's a fascinating story I missed during the Fourth of July week: NPR reports on an unlikely "respect" between criminal gangs in El Salvador and the nation's evangelical churches.

I really enjoyed the piece and felt like the writer did some excellent reporting.

After reading it all, though, I found myself wondering — and there's a chance this is just me being overly skeptical — whether the narrative is a bit too perfect.

In other words, life is complicated, and the NPR storyline is simple. Perhaps too simple.

I'll explain what I mean in a moment. But first, let's set the scene with the opening paragraphs:

In El Salvador's capital, San Salvador, people drive around with their car windows closed to avoid petty theft. But when they enter neighborhoods controlled by gangs, they keep their car windows open, to show their faces. That way the gangs know they're not an enemy.

In the center of one such neighborhood, known as La Dina, a tiny Baptist church sits on a narrow street. In a neighborhood notorious for violence, it is the one place gangs leave alone.

The church underscores the growing ties between gangs in El Salvador and evangelical Christianity. In a country where Roman Catholicism has traditionally predominated, evangelicalism is growing and has gained the respect and endorsement of gangs — a rare point of agreement even for rival groups like Barrio 18 and MS-13, the country's two biggest gangs.

It has also left many boys and men growing up in gang-controlled areas with stark choices: According to academic research and interviews with pastors and former gang members, their only alternative to joining a gang — or getting out of one — is to become a devoted member of an evangelical church.

Later, NPR quotes an expert who has studied the relationship between the gangs and the churches — and he's certainly a strong source: