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Atheist Nazis? The Pope’s Cheap Atonement

Adam Clayton Powell called it “cheap grace,” but we might call it “cheap atonement”: the effort by sinners to select which sins to acknowledge and repent. Pope Benedict XVI ended his heavily protested visit to England with a heartfelt apology for German bombings of England during the Battle of Britain; though he refused to accept Christian responsibility for the Holocaust, blaming it instead on pagans and atheists. Given that Cardinal Walter Kasp…

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The Economy is Racism: Ending Race-Based Economic Violence is the Real Challenge of This Moment

…have been kept down at the very bottom in order for the American System of cheap labor to function. Although Henry Clay opposed slavery in theory, the need for this ongoing subjugation was most certainly in the mind of The Great Compromiser who coined the term “American System” during the expansionist years of ‘Indian removal’ and a related Second Middle Passage that took over one million people in shackles from the Chesapeake to the rich bottomla…

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Are Evangelical Films Destined to Leave Secular Audiences Behind?

…e success either. The opening weekend saw sales of more than $6 million in tickets. That’s the kind of number that will inspire others to try and figure out the formula for the faith-and-family blockbuster. Yet, with the cost of the film reportedly exceeding $30 million, it’s an open question whether or not the Left Behind reboot will get a second installment. The marketing problem of evangelical movies is still, stubbornly, a problem. The general…

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A Meditation on Shopping and Desire

…eap goods are cheaply made. I am not speaking of quality, I am speaking of cheap labor. We must recognize that through the act of shopping, whether it is for an article of clothing, a toy, a pint of strawberries, or even our morning cup of coffee, we participate in a global economy that values profit over people. Disposable goods are made by disposable people, faceless individuals whose backbreaking and unjustly paid labor produce the goods we con…

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Glenn Beck’s Cheap Grace

…way from the hard work of repentance, who tickle our ears with promises of cheap grace, and offer a vision of the cross of Jesus that has nothing to say to the crosses, and lynching trees, of history. But, if we do, we will be settling for the gospel of Caesar, not the good news of Jesus Christ. Perhaps it is time to put down the chalk, stop drawing pyrotechnical conspiracy theories that play into our worst fears and listen, instead, for the diffi…

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Wal-Mart Faces a New Round of Historic Strikes… But Why Now?

…hedules. They’ve demanded a halt to such actions by November 23, “Black Friday,” the biggest shopping day of the year. If the company doesn’t move to meet their demands by then, the workers and their allies say there will be more strikes, sit-ins, rallies, and other actions across the country.  Wal-Mart’s reputation as a Christian company has been one of the reasons the retail giant has been notoriously hard to organize. The company embedded itsel…

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Pope Praises ‘Complementarity’ & Resists Gay Ambassador; Irish Religious Leaders Spar Over Marriage; Colombian Atty Gen Cites ‘Bogus’ Study Opposing Adoption; Global LGBT Recap

…ernment’s methods and accused them of trying to force his hand. Last Wednesday, three days before Stéfanini’s meeting with Francis, the French president, François Hollande, had let it be known he was sticking by his first choice for the job. Usually, a country would not put a nominee forward to the Holy See if it knew following informal talks that the nominee might not be seen as acceptable. Since the row erupted, the Elysée palace has insisted th…

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Bible College Pres Arrested for Forced Labor: Hypocrite or Extremist?

…a social-linguistic horizon that, when pushed, makes the notion of forced labor legitimate to those doing the forcing. Most Christians today (though not necessarily in the past) would likely denounce that logic as abhorrent, as an illegitimate extension of the language involved—and rightly so. But the problem lies in the language itself—servant, master, lord, and so on—and the types of relationships that that language implies and reinforces, rath…

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The Faith that Faith Produced

…ou’ll read an excerpt below—has surprised me, too.  I wish I could find my airline companion and give him this book, to surprise him, too—in a good way. (I would accept Lakers tickets in lieu of apologies, but I think that particular era is done.) This whole book is a result of a profound evolution, and needs to be seen as such. American Muslims have gone through a lot over the last few decades. We were never the caricature Islamophobes made us ou…

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Corporations Have Consciences and Contraceptives Are Cheap: Hobby Lobby at the Supreme Court

At oral argument in Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. and Conestoga Wood Specialties, Inc. v. Sebelius this morning, the Supreme Court justices spent a great deal of time questioning the lawyers in the case about whether corporations have a religious conscience, and whether Congress intended to protect it when enacting the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). What was most striking, though, was how all three female justices, Sonia So…

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