Religion Dispatches
…ees us as a unique species—not like any other animal. He has, for example, reservations about animal rights. Too much empathy for other creatures, he alleges, can lead to “empathy inflation.” If we want to protect the rights of non-humans, we might as well torture ourselves over whether or not we have the right to kill the harmful bacteria that’s crawling around on (and in) us. The borders of the human might be “variegated and fuzzy,” Lanier says,…
Read More
…Rather than studying how people live Jewish lives, the emphasis is on the numbers of bodies that “count” as Jewish. More disturbing still are the legacies of scientific racism evident in the language of “intermarriage,” “in-marriage,” and “out-marriage.” We suspect that such constructs may unintentionally amplify intra-Jewish prejudice and discrimination towards non-Ashkenazi and non-white Jews. This shapes an academic field in which people of ce…
Read More
…s good faith to those with whom one disagrees. For example, whatever one’s reservations might be about whether the “Come Let Us Reason Together Governing Agenda” goes far enough, it is indisputable that it marks movement in key policy areas. It is the first time that mainstream evangelicals have publicly supported policies on abortion that have no bans or restrictions and that include support for prevention of unintended pregnancy, including compr…
Read More
…of discussion, and to no one’s surprise, the group decided to shelve their reservations about John McCain and endorse him in the fall campaign. “The alternative is so bad,” Phyllis Schlafly declared, “we must support John McCain.” The meeting was called by Mathew Staver, dean of the law school at Liberty University. Those in attendance included Phil Burress, president of Citizens for Community Values in Ohio, Alveda King, niece of Martin Luther Ki…
Read More
…est Side magazine and were less surprised. The only one who expressed some reservations was a prominent congregant whom I described as a political leader while he considered himself more of a spiritual leader. But he told me he read the book twice and found no other wrong descriptions. I think he was surprised I had so much to tell about the synagogue’s dynamics and its membership. I continue to meet with close friends on my visits to NY as well a…
Read More
…of six million, while Plan B was to kill only acutely guilty SS soldiers, numbering in the thousands. As Kovner met with Yishuv leaders it was clear that while there may have been sympathy with Plan A, only Plan B would receive the support of even the angriest of Palestine’s Jewish community. Plan B’s support came from leadership of the Haganah, the fighting force that would eventually lead the 1948 war. The Yishuv, itself working to unify Palest…
Read More
…aspiration is on-point for him. His disdain for his fellow conservatives’ reservations against wielding state power and calls to abandon any libertarian influence make perfect sense: the belief in “small government” that’s been a part of the GOP for so long stands in the way of the totalitarian use of state power to enforce the minority’s will on the majority of Americans. Davidson spells out exactly what he means: “Put bluntly, if conservatives…
Read More
…ey face a common enemy. Alternate histories are usually insightful for any number of reasons (and fun for those reasons, too), but why the author chooses to write them can be equally illuminating. What pushed you to write this, and when did you start on it? Like a lot of novelists, I started thinking about writing a 9/11 story pretty much from the moment the towers fell. I wanted to write something distinctive, though, not just a minor variation o…
Read More
…the urban centers of America, favelas of Brazil, shanties of Jamaica, and reservations of the American West. For years, I would anticipate the arrival of spring and Passover season. Meticulously cleaning my house of leaven as I awaited this celebration of freedom. Now when I watched The Ten Commandments I was once again rooting for Moses (albeit a white one) and the Hebrews as they dueled with Ramses and the Egyptians. But then something unexpect…
Read More…e “out of the closet”. What we were hearing – and it has snatched the microphone of homosexual life in the same unrepresentative way that Islamism has grabbed the public voice of Muslims – was the voice of a self-appointed moral policeman. If you are gay, Mr Strudwick seemed to assert, there are certain things you must believe. Nothing else is permitted under the gay rights sharia. Nigeria: Presidential candidate denies marriage-equality deal We r…
Read More