Religion Dispatches
…curity, while jihadi movements likely feel themselves to be vindicated. Ayman al-Zawahiri had condemned the Brotherhood for deciding to take part in elections, and you can bet he, like so many other cynical actors, greets this bloodshed with glee, for it advances his vile and immoral ends….
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…to what Donnie McClurkin said in his video response to the actions of the promoters disinviting him to sing? McClurkin said in a Socialcam video that “It is unfortunate that in today that a black man, a black artist is uninvited to a civil rights movement, depicting the love, the unity, the peace, the tolerance….” He goes on to say that: “…Discrimination, bullying is still a part of this…its bullying, it’s discrimination, it’s intolerance and it…
Read More…ay next Tuesday as he presents the findings of his gun task force. You can bet there will be something about closing the now infamous “gun show” loophole that allows for nearly 40% of gun purchases to proceed without a background check, as well something about reinstating bans on assault weapons—like the weapon used at Sandy Hook elementary. Maybe Vice President Biden will also underscore an obvious national need for better mental health screening…
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…rged. The origin of this project, we’re told, was with a 2007 episode of BET’s American Gangster devoted to the infamous career of Jeff Fort. Natalie Moore, a journalist and author of a book about masculinity in hip-hop, watched the show, saw professor and youth activist Lance Williams interviewed in it, and the next day she emailed him, asking for a list of books about contemporary black street gangs in Chicago. “There are none,” he replied. An…
Read More…the housing bust. Many people may simply be postponing childbearing until better times return, and a few years of swift growth could produce a miniature baby boom. Good. Here we have actual people making decisions about childbearing, and in the process considering their own economic conditions. He goes on to say that “America has no real family policy to speak of at the moment, and the evidence from countries like Sweden and France suggests that…
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…as the most important issue. The political divide in the Jewish community between Orthodox Jews and the rest of American Jewry is reflected in the fact that Orthodox Jews support Romney over Obama by 54 to 40 percent, while Conservative, Reform and “just Jewish” voters favor Obama by between 64 and 68 percent. Orthodox Jews made up just 8.3% of the respondents to the AJC poll. The rest: Conservative, 26.6%; Reconstructionist, 1.6%; Reform, 32.2%;…
Read More…he 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 an anti-Mormon ad lib, it does not make for a concerted anti-Mormon effort. (Leave that to ortho…
Read More…h I do expect our supplies will run out in about 48 hours because we’re the types that feed the neighbors.) Mitt Romney, this tropical storm is in your wheelhouse. I bet your pragmatic mind is spinning through all the logistics. 72 hour kits for everyone! You can do this!…
Read More…mockery he has now attracted, this relatively obscure congressman whom I’d bet half the pundits discussing his fate today had barely heard of before his primary win, is a National Superstar, the very embodiment of the Christian Right’s all-too-often abandoned determination to stand up to GOP pols who forever pay them lip service but rarely deliver the goods. […] And if he does win, he will enter the Senate next year not as some random wingnut dude…
Read More…focus of the sermon (Mother’s Day is the worst, and if you are laughing I bet you know Nancy’s work). But submission theology also permeates every part of Christian life in our young woman’s world. Her interest in things intellectual is looked upon with suspicion or derision. Her leadership qualities are squeezed into “appropriate” but ill-fitting tasks like working with the children. It seems that no part of who she knows herself to be is welcom…
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