Religion Dispatches
…obal Muslim conversation as any other society. But that’s not the greatest change Obama has indicated. Through the president’s strategy, America has given herself the right to participate in Islamic conversations. America, a Muslim-minority state, is as relevant to Islam as a Muslim-majority state. In fact, America is the most relevant: We are the hinge at which Muslim-minority and -majority meet. It’s a fascinating, controversial, and confusing m…
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…I’m not trading in my TREO, and I’m not canceling the media package on my phone or reducing the number of messages I sent through that magical device. I am not calling for a technology purge. I’m simply noting that technology comes with a price, and this price has something of a postmodern twist. By this I mean that tweeting and other high-tech modalities of exchange send information about happenings, attitudes, feelings, and events—but in a way…
Read More…’s new official explanation. That’s a lot of intention to read into a date change the Air Force has never denied, which makes the claim that this evidence is “totally at odds with the Air Force’s new official explanation” willfully misleading. From the beginning, the Air Force claimed they moved up Monk’s redeployment when his replacement arrived early, making Monk’s continued presence in his old unit unnecessary and redundant, whereas he was need…
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…hey still cared for me. And I can’t tell you how many times I remember the phone call she made and the letter he sent. To the rest of you, those I potlucked with, laughed with, held your hands, loved your babies, went to your weddings, your sickbeds, your moments of crisis: Where are you? Why have you let me go to what you believe to be perdition? Are you just too busy? Did I never matter that much? Have I fooled myself believing we were bonded fo…
Read More…ans and 50 percent of the general population identified as “pro-life”; the number of Americans who identified as “pro-choice” hit a record low. But respondents’ opinions on policy issues around abortion had not drastically changed from previous years. Just over half of Americans think abortion should be “legal under certain” circumstances, only 2 percent more people than last year. Meanwhile, 25 percent of Americans (compared to 27 percent in 2011…
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…ome perspective. Admittedly, this is an unscientific analysis of potential changes, but as a regular reader, the front page of Crux represents a marked drift toward just the kind of Church-friendly coverage many fear the site will begin to feature. This morning, the death of EWTN’s Mother Angelica is greeted with a tribute from Allen entitled “We shall not look upon the likes of Mother Angelica again.” It’s a fairly balanced account of her life, b…
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…aside and quietly told us that he had detected our American accents on the phone, and had given us the room instead of others because “Americans hate Muslims, too.” Still today, when I travel in India, Hindus presupposing my agreement frequently make off-handed and derogatory comments about their Muslim neighbors. For those concerned about the effectiveness of the United States’ advocacy for religious freedom around the world, the perception that…
Read More…come to terms with their sexuality and didn’t try to repress or ask God to change it, but had accepted it as part of who God created them to be. And I started to think that people don’t choose to be gay any more than I chose to be straight. Why in the world would someone choose to go through such heartache and pain? It didn’t make sense to me. All of those experiences changed my mind in pretty significant ways, so much so that I now view things mu…
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…fight. If someone had pressed into his fingers at that pivotal moment the phone number for The Trevor Project, he might reach out and hear a voice of reassurance, a voice that gave him hope for life by, in part, repudiating the so-called biblical teaching that who he is amounts to an offense against God. If he’d had a sense of belonging to a community that embraced him for who he is, maybe his hope wouldn’t be so fully shattered. But while other…
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…enders called such borrowers just a couple of years ago. They loved making phone calls that even their supremely unqualified mortgage applicants found somewhat hard to believe: “Congratulations: your loan has been approved! You will close in 15 minutes. And lucky you: there’s no need to show up or even supply a check. Everything is rolled right into the loan. Woo-hoo!” Yeah, we all went for it. We were approved so easily. Who doesn’t what to be “a…
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