Religion Dispatches
…The Pew Research Center has found that American Muslims are mostly middle-class and mainstream; Islam is one of many American faiths. During the Ramadan that fell in December of 2001, Pope John Paul II urged Christians to fast for one day in solidarity with Muslims. I was so moved that I felt a rush of gratitude and awe. The “solidarity fast“ was evidence that, instead of using Ramadan—a holiday that reminds us to empathize with others—to instiga…
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…r James to hang a picture of a pope on the blackboard so she can watch her class reflected in the glass. Sister James doesn’t have a picture of Paul VI, or even John XXIII, so instead she puts up a picture of a dour Pius XII. Sister Aloysius draws her power—the eyes in the back of her head—from the pontiff of an earlier era, the last pope before Vatican II. The film excises an explicit reference to the Council made in the play, but it’s still clea…
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…has an air of righteousness and entitlement born of their decidedly middle-class roots and membership. Their voice is meant to be heard. And their political and social action is related directly to a belief that a person’s religious and public identity should not be separated. The conflict between themselves and mainstream America is largely a cultural one, and misapplied terms and simplifications can only muddy the water. At a time when the relig…
Read More…ommonly attendant to urban living. Even his name is a sly joke for working class sophisticates, common men who’d know enough about culture to be able to whistle “Fanfare for the Common Man,” another populist delusion penned in 1942. That doesn’t sound like Sarah Palin. Too many Obama supporters have been too quick to prove Palin right when she spoke of the snobs who look down on people like her. Palin is from a small town, and her interests are th…
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…and, to some extent, boring. It’s somewhat sophisticated and upper-middle class aesthetics. The sermons mention scholarship and Time Magazine as much as it mentions the Bible. Are northwest evangelical churches aligned with the religious right? With evangelicals, we never found a theocrat or a fascist. They’re very loyal to certain politicians, but very suspicious of politics. Some evangelical pastors were exceptionally critical of the politician…
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…be sure, this sort of nobility transcends both aristocratic arrogance and class conceit. Rather it is derived from humble commitment to serving others, reminding us all of our better human potential. And such a magisterial manner—to remix womanist theologian Katie Cannon—is demonstrated by an invisible yet tangible dignity, quiet yet powerful grace, and an unshouted though heart-thumping courage. This defines the towering life and lasting legacy…
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…e, the son of a fireman who struggled to make ends meet, effectively wages class warfare against the party insiders and libertarian “faux-cons” in Washington; he lashes out at the likes of National Review magazine and the Club for Growth, whom he calls “the silk-stocking crowd,” for looking down their noses at the blue collar “values voters” that Huckabee claims to represent. Two chapters are devoted to holding himself up as the representative of…
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…e opposition around them. The idea for the book came in 1998 when I took a class in the martial art of Aikido. There are no offensive moves in Aikido—no kicks or punches. There are only defensive moves—using the momentum of your attacker to disable them. I thought it served as an excellent metaphor for “spiritual self-defense” for LGBT Christians. I also came across the Bible verse that became central to the book, 1 Peter 3:15-16: “Always be ready…
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…suade you from reading Anthea Butler’s new book. Butler writes about lower class African-American Pentecostal women, a sadly understudied group. Focusing on the experience of sanctification, and the concomitant “dedication to both spiritual practices and temporal obedience,” Butler looks at how belief shaped these women’s understanding of self, community, and God, enabling them to “negotiate for and obtain power” in ways that defied expectations f…
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…ation [about] how he might accomplish his dream [bringing together working-class Catholics and evangelical Protestants] when he attended a political strategy session run by liberal operatives.” Although Weyrich hadn’t been invited to the confab—and to my knowledge he never revealed how he got there—Martin’s book quoted him as saying that “there before my eyes was revealed the modus operandi of the left:” They had all these different groups, includ…
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