Religion Dispatches
A scholar returning from a visit with Syrian opposition figures discusses the role of religion in the Syrian civil war, including whether it’s a sectarian war, what Americans need to know, and whether a post-war Syria will be an Islamic state.
Read MoreCreepy postings on the Israeli embassy’s FB wall are getting a lot of press.
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What happens in the Middle East isn’t always about us.
Read MoreJesus… not just for Christians.
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If there is one thing people need during a national disaster, it is functioning and effective government. If there is one time we need redistributive justice, it is during a crisis. Much of politics perhaps just comes down to what is, and is not, a crisis—a hurricane I hope we can all agree on. But what about climate change? Or health care? What is life-threatening? What is an emergency?
Read MoreMy Stephen Colbert moment.
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For many Americans, the Muslim world is dangerous. It is a place mired in the thick sludge of the past, peopled by exotic and prickly foreigners who, at any slight however real or perceived, fly off into a mad rage. It is irrationality’s last refuge, a museum shop of medieval horrors that has somehow survived the rest of the planet’s transition to the 21st century. Recent events might seem to only confirm this assessment. A fair-minded observer might plausibly ask, “Are Muslims nuts?” Although, to be entirely fair-minded, for the thousands who did protest against “The Innocence of Muslims,” well over a billion and a half did not.
Read MoreTo say Muslims are offended by portrayals of Muhammad is missing the point…
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I remember thinking, with Western intervention in Libya, that this all had a familiar ring to it. But perhaps this time would be different, many of us hoped. How, though, one conflict can escape the reality of its conditions and not realize certain consequences is beyond me.
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“I was washing dishes in the kitchen when I stopped believing in God. Years later, I’m often unsettled at how much of my life I’d spent in that kitchen and how little of it I can recall, except for that one moment. Overwhelmed by constant desperation, I turned suddenly courageous, pondered what might happen if He didn’t exist, decided that He didn’t, and then He was gone. I think the rapid departure hit me the hardest. How had I been so easily taken in?”
—An excerpt from Haroon Moghul’s essay in All American: 45 American Men on Being Muslim