Religion Dispatches
…f responsibility shown by “the darks.” As well, there are people who have explicitly chosen not to live in The City. Expats from the city, some wealthy, some less so, settle in the country. Most of these folks carry that “responsibility” frame of reference, which they link to the downsides of living in a city: noise, crime, asshole neighbors. There are also many people who grew up in the country and have decided to remain, or return after a few ye…
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…media as a few of his brother cardinals did at the zenith of the clergy sex abuse scandal). He also didn’t lie to us (at least not as far as I know), which is an all-too-often rare experience among religious leaders, whether in the throes of crisis or not. For many years as a religion journalist, and even as a columnist where I was supposed to offer my opinion and perspective, I kept my own spiritual and religious predilections to myself lest I a…
Read More…eports like Donohue’s and Deal’s are cropping up, and Mormons are feeling extra sensitive about the fate of the nation’s first major party presidential candidate. But I’ll bet you a twelve pack of caffeine-free Diet Coke and a dozen pink-frosted sugar cookies that there is no anti-Mormon phonebanking script in use by Catholics for Obama. Anywhere. Is anti-Mormonism real? Yes. But even if one poorly-trained rogue phonebanker veered off script into…
Read More…tly thought they own the category of faith (though Circle of Moms doesn’t exhibit any signs of being explicitly religious). It turns out that someone in the community of Pagan and Witch moms, many of whom also homeschool, nominated Mrs. B at the blog Confessions of a Pagan Soccer Mom. Then many of the biblical women got concerned about witches and pagans in the contest, expressing shock and horror. They organized to vote for the Christians and app…
Read More…gives the pontiff latitude over the composition of the synod in Articles IX and X: In choosing those who are to represent the episcopal Conferences of one or a number of nations and the religious institutes in the Synod of Bishops, great attention should be paid not just to the general knowledge and wisdom of individuals, but also to their theoretical and practical knowledge of the matter which the Synod is to take up. The Supreme Pontiff may, if…
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…e dinner parties with seemingly inexplicable rants over NAFTA, I could be expected to wax wroth over the big yawn with which the corporate media greeted the August employment numbers on Friday (the commonest headline: “Job Losses Smaller Than Expected”). And wax wroth I shall. Okay, corporatized newsies: You say that “only” 216,000 jobs disappeared last month? Folks, we’ve got 15 million people without jobs and in desperate shape out there. Toss i…
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…eing a range of issues as “life” issues, including war, poverty, racism, sexism, heterosexism, and environmental destruction. That Catholics will vote their consciences is not in question. That they have informed them on more than matters of abortion is a welcome change. Catholics of Tomorrow The first test of this new consensus will be in the presidential election itself. My crystal ball is out of commission, the polls can be wrong, and anything…
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…religious complex will get more interesting .It is not the religious complex that is complex, rather, the existence of Zoe and Tamara offer more interesting questions about what composes one’s personal “essence” In other words, what is it that makes you, you? And if a dog, in this case, Zoe’s dog, can recognize Zoe, what is it then that makes her dog be able to see her, even through all of the metal her essence is encased in? I know Dog is GOD spe…
Read More…tion is currency and anonymity is easy to come by. A version of this paradox exists in the realm of mass shootings, too. Acts of random violence often seem, in part, to function as dramatic plays for attention or celebrity status. The Orlando nightclub shooter reportedly checked his phone for news about the shooting during the actual event; the man who murdered hostages at the Hyper Cacher kosher grocery store in Paris last year filmed the attack…
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…ion of evangelicals was more moderate than its forebears, less likely to fixate on gay marriage as a wedge issue, and more interested in reaching “common ground” with liberals than wage battle in the culture wars. One of the prime examples of this “new” kind of evangelical was the Rev. Samuel Rodriguez of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, who has since gone on to compare health care reform to King Herod, give the benediction a…
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