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Welcome to the Shari’ah Conspiracy Theory Industry

By Sarah Posner

…onstitution.” Based on the “explanatory memorandum” document identifying a number of American Muslim organizations as allies in its author’s aspirations, prosecutors in the Holy Land Foundation trial publicly labeled over 200 American Muslim organizations “unindicted co-conspirators,” a highly controversial move derided at the time by legal experts as contrary to Justice Department policy and in violation of the groups’ constitutional rights. Even…

The Sacred and the Dead: Three Ways to American Beauty

By Aaron K. Kerr

…s duplicity. The letters (signs) can be read two ways: they represent both American Beauty and American Reality. In western thought, beauty and reality are of a piece since the good, the true, and the beautiful inform and form each other. But beauty can deceive, money talks, and power attracts. The Dead understand and critique this duplicity. In order to understand it they conjure American figures who exemplify this contradiction, a sort of courag…

Yom Kippur Prayers for Corporate Atonement at Occupy Wall St.

By Sarah Posner

…e and was organized via social media? It’s definitely not the first Jewish service to take place at a protest, but a Kol Nidre service at an economic protest organized over Twitter, Tumblr, and Facebook? Yes. Quite likely a first. It’s also super exciting to see such an incredible response. Kol Nidre is the evening service of the holiest Jewish holiday, Yom Kippur. These Aramaic words mean “all vows,” and in the Kol Nidre service the cantor recite…

America, the Mythical: “Mother of Exiles” or Denier of Safe Haven?

By Ed Simon

…c story of America’s foundation. The conservative reads a tale about Anglo-American Protestant hegemony and the opening up of North American resources. But the radical, perhaps even the mystical interpreter, reads a more allegorically profound story about America as “Mother of Exiles,” a universal space that encompases all ethnicities, cultures, and religions precisely because of its universality. Arguments about the significance of the pilgrims b…

America, the Mythical: “Mother of Exiles” or Denier of Safe Haven?

By Ed Simon

…c story of America’s foundation. The conservative reads a tale about Anglo-American Protestant hegemony and the opening up of North American resources. But the radical, perhaps even the mystical interpreter, reads a more allegorically profound story about America as “Mother of Exiles,” a universal space that encompases all ethnicities, cultures, and religions precisely because of its universality. Arguments about the significance of the pilgrims b…

Evangelicals Looking for Walker to “Do Nothing” in 2016 Election

By Sarah Posner

…of the culture wars. Legal exemptions to permit florists, caterers, social service providers, or other businesses to refuse service to LGBT people are hotly contested, both in legal circles and in the court of public opinion. In another context, the Hobby Lobby litigation, in which the Supreme Court ruled that the contraception coverage requirement under the Affordable Care Act violated a closely-held corporation’s rights under the Religious Freed…

Pawlenty Stars in American Civil Religion: The Movie

By Michael J. Altman

…d images of Pawlenty himself. Pawlenty sets up himself and these “everyday Americans” as the symbols of the Puritan-American work ethic. Finally, our exceptionalism and our hard work give Americans a special destiny. The third myth in the ad is Manifest Destiny, the narrative from American history that argues a special purpose for our country to spread its influence around the world. In the 19th century, Manifest Destiny meant expansion out west….

American Jewish Leaders Get Gaza Wrong

By Sarah Posner

…past with Gaza, dividing over whether to back Operation Cast Lead in 2008. Reservations about Israel’s use of force in Gaza have continued. In 2009, Yoffie called American Jewish critics of Cast Lead “morally deficient, profoundly out of touch with Jewish sentiment and also appallingly naïve.” Yoffie’s words supporting what the Israeli military has named Operation Pillar of Cloud horrify me. The current president of the URJ, Rabbi Rick Jacobs, tr…

Founding Father John Adams’ Advice to Rick Perry: Don’t Meddle in Religion

By Warren Throckmorton

…ponse point to the funding source as evidence of its exclusive nature: the American Family Association. The AFA’s Bryan Fischer has said that Native Americans were “morally disqualified” from holding their lands because of savagery and immorality; that gays in the Nazi military were responsible for “six million dead Jews”; that the First Amendment only applies to Christians (which is his basis for preaching that Muslims do not have the right to bu…

The Intellectual Source Code For National Conservatism Can Be Found at This Niche Catholic Publication

By Peter Schwartz

…unding the National Conservative movement is not without precedent. Between 1800 and 1950, Europe endured what amounted to a second Catholic Counter-Reformation. In the latter portion of the 19th century, predominantly Catholic countries in Europe—which of course European nations have largely been since the 1648 Peace of Westphalia—experienced an upsurge of royalist and irredentist passions to which the Catholic Church often attached itself (for e…