Religion Dispatches
…Associate Editor Hussein Rashid appeared on the BBC show Beyond Belief on Oct. 4, 2010, to discuss the history and place of Islam in America. Other panelists include Robert Salaam of The American Muslim and Daniel Pipes. About half the show focuses on the Park51 controversy and responding to Pam Gellar’s incitement against New Yorkers’ right to self-determination. …
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…eries through the post. I have not yet worked this out with the publisher Oneworld Publications, but hope to do so, considering the political situation in many Muslim-majority countries and the tenuous privacy that people have within their families. I believe that—for better or for worse—Muslims in the West have a privileged place in this progressive dialogue. The opinions expressed by Muslims in the USA, Canada, Europe, and South Africa have a g…
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…rst pope to address a joint session of Congress; and held public events in New York and Philadelphia, where he attended the Vatican’s gay-excluding World Meeting of Families. The pope generally did not address LGBT people or issues head-on, but more indirectly through the lens of “the family” and “religious liberty.” On Sunday the 27th, the final day of his trip, Francis told bishops that it is “dangerously unbalanced” to focus on explaining doctr…
Read More…the 16-year-old who died after being stabbed by an ultra-Orthodox man at Jerusalem’s Pride parade. Gambia: President threatens to kill nephew for supporting LGBT rights Alagie Jammeh, 25-year-old nephew of the country’s viciously anti-gay president, has been threatened by his uncle with life in prison or execution if he ever returns to the country. His crime? Saying on Facebook, “No one should be denied their fundamental basic human rights because…
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…rs to implement the most spectacular migration crackdown,” Miller told the New York Times, adding, “The immigration legal activists won’t know what’s happening.”[66] The far-right’s far-reaching revolution As Project 2025 envisions Trump or another MAGA-minded president maximizing presidential power and dominating the executive branch with an iron fist, its agenda converges with the long-term right-wing goal of diminishing and dismantling the fede…
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…ever he dies. He’s met his demise ten times now, each time emerging with a new face and new personality. The first three episodes of the current season use that regeneration as the jumping-off point for a sort of trilogy exploring the show’s interlocking themes of identity, morality, and integrity. As years pass and more actors step into the role, it becomes increasingly important for each performer to distinguish their version of the Doctor from…
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…center driven by real estate, banking, and the stock market. Yes of course New York is the American center of theater, fine art and publishing; but even with these folks the talk is of money, financing, advances, sales figures. The pandemic will change a lot of things about New York City, but not its obsession with money. Of course, I can think of a few complicating factors. The outgoing president is the Emperor of BS, and he is, or was, a New Yor…
Read More…them. Here’s one example of how that refusal to acknowledge plays out. The New York Jewish Weekhas just published an op-ed by Oded Na’aman, an Israeli army veteran who now works with the Israeli human rights group Breaking The Silence, which, using the testimonies of former IDF soldiers, educates the public about abuses committed by the Israeli military in the occupied territories. (I wrote about Breaking The Silence, and the generational shift am…
Read More…music—the Sierra Club and Doctors Without Borders! But what if Girl Scouts USA were to turn the tables and scrutinize the bishops’ group overseeing the investigation: the Committee on Laity, Marriage, Family Life, and Youth? After all, that committee includes the Most Rev. Salvatore J. Cordileone, Bishop of Oakland, who publicly bemoaned the fact that former Harvard president Lawrence Summers was excoriated for suggesting that women tend to have l…
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…n passing. While many publications, including the BBC, Daily Mail, and The New York Times[3] noted the conspicuous absence of more explicit references to the ongoing bloody conflict, none commented on the main subject of Putin’s address: the advancement of traditional family values. At first glance, the phrase “traditional family values”[4] might appear absurd when applied to a large, multiethnic country—one that toyed with rather radical ideas ab…
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