Religion Dispatches
…plugged-in lifestyle doesn’t really get at the heart of the issue. I think the Amish, of all people, have it right. It’s not so much about what you as an individual are doing or not doing, as the effect technology has on the community: Why not make life easier and just put [a phone] in the house? “What would that lead to?” another Amish man asked me. “We don’t want to be the kind of people who will interrupt a conversation at home to answer a tel…
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…ualism is bad. Also, he notes but offers no explanation for the decreasing number of marriages in many countries. I am glad to see that in Section 34 he understands this basic fact of contemporary western culture: The ideal of marriage, marked by a commitment to exclusivity and stability, is swept aside whenever it proves inconvenient or tiresome. The fear of loneliness and the desire for stability and fidelity exist side by side with a growing fe…
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…te segregation and economic favoritism. When I spoke with Rothstein on the phone, he underscored the long-term effects of this last policy. During the 1940s and 1950s, suburban subdivisions were built in St. Louis, and throughout the country, using federal loans stipulating that no homes be sold to African Americans. Priced at about $125,000 in today’s dollars, these were affordable—with a mortgage—to working class families, black or white. Yet bl…
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…age. His 2012 book, The Buddha Walks into a Bar, has sold widely. Over the phone, I asked Rinzler why he and Burrows had chosen to establish the studio as a for-profit company. “We really wanted to make sure we had all the resources we need for supporting people who are trying meditation for the first time,” Rinzler explained. Because they’re a business, there’s more professionalism. The teachers they’ve hired show up on time, and, as Rinzler put…
Read More…rro, a founding member of the organization and a leading advocate in Peru. France: Former President Says Marriage Equality Law ‘Humiliates’ Families The “twice-divorces and thrice-married” Former President Nicolas Sarkozy is being criticized for recent attacks on marriage equality legislation that some see as a way to position himself for a return to politics: In a 45-minute prime-time TV interview, Sarkozy, The Guardianreports, “became animated a…
Read More…ing will begin: Did the nomination of the Alaska governor help or hurt the ticket? Did playing solely to the base—religious conservatives in particular—limited the ticket’s appeal? Does the Party have to become more mainstream, more inclusive, and more tolerant? Is Palin to be the Party’s savior? Or, have the American people learned more than enough about some of the less-than-ethical ways she goes about her business? Everyone will have an opinion…
Read More…ey last year found 83 percent support in Luxembourg for marriage equality. France: Government Announces 7,000 Same-Sex Couples Married Last Year France’s national statistics agency, Insee, announced this week that about 7,000 same-sex couples were married last year, representing about 3 percent of marriages nationwide. Same-sex couples won the right to marry in May over strong objections from the Catholic Church, the far right, and others – chee…
Read More…n rights defenders advocating for the human rights of the LGBT community.” France: Far-Right Looks to Putin for Funding TIME magazine reported that Marine Le Pen has received a multi-million dollar loan from a Moscow bank to fund the National Front Party. “At this stage, Russia is trying to influence French domestic policy,” says Jean-Yves Camus, a political researcher at France’s Institute of International and Strategic Relations (IRIS). If so, P…
Read More…ature. He then founded HM2F, an association for gay and lesbian Muslims in France. Two years ago, when the news broke that no imam would bury a Muslim transsexual who had died in France, Zahed founded a mosque in Paris. He intended it as a place where all people could find an imam who would treat them with dignity, bury or marry them and give them a sense of belonging, regardless whether they loved men or women. He also found a partner and the two…
Read More…es ECI’s leadership – knows this to be the case. Which makes ECI’s video a cheap lie — yet another in a long litany of desperate efforts by the far right to convert the largely liberal American Jewish community to neo-conservatism, hawkish policies on Israel, and the belief that “Barack Hussein Obama” is a Muslim. That said, there actually are two interesting forms of antisemitism going on here. First is the antisemitism of ECI itself. To tug at…
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