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On Using Religious Language in Public, Right and Left

By Daniel Schultz

…ievers, scripture is a deep well of stories. Sarah Posner named two of the most popular ones on the conservative side in her report from the Values Voters Summit: David and Goliath and the story of Esther. Both fit the conservative framework of opposition to overwhelming power very nicely. It’s no wonder they keep coming back to them time and again. We don’t do nearly as good a job on the liberal side. Take, for example, this piece by CAP Senior F…

Days of Reckoning for the Philadelphia Archdiocese

By Anthea Butler

…That man molested me. He knows it. He knows it. He knows it.” So was the testimony of “Mark” on April 5, Holy Thursday, in the case of Monsignor William Lynn and the Rev. James Brennan, currently on trial in Philadelphia. Lynn is accused of attempting to hide evidence of abuse by clergy, moving pedophile priests among parishes, and of endangering the welfare of two children. Brennan is accused of raping a 14-year-old boy, “Mark,” whose abuse is de…

Christmas Candy Jesus, Black Magi, Jewish Xmas

By Michael J. Altman

…research group finds that only 37% of Americans include Jesus in their Christmas festivities. One small group of Christians think this enough to warrant executing Santa. Jolly ole St. Nicholas’ home town was in Turkey and the town of Demre is cashing in on their favorite son. The story of the nativity through social networks. Jamaicans are using the first patois version of the Gospel of Luke in this year’s Christmas celebrations. Under continued t…

History in the Making: Religion, Race and Gender in the Presidential Election

By Peter J. Paris

…s defined as unpatriotic. Since Senator McCain’s position on religion is almo*]}*st wholly private, it is unclear how it functions in relation to politics, he has had an uneasy relationship with the extreme right-wing Christian camp in his party which strives to legislate its views on such hot topics as abortion, prayer in public schools, intelligent design as a viable alternative to science, heterosexuality as the only normal condition for human bein…

Eulogy, Corrected: Father Matthew Came Out as Gay 30 Years Earlier

By Louis A. Ruprecht

…i, I left a lot of things out. I did so partly for reasons of brevity, but mostly for reasons of care and concern. A eulogy is a celebration of a life, a life now lost to us, and even if I elected to tell his story in tandem with Thomas Merton’s, the point was to let Matthew’s words be heard as they deserve to be. I tried, as best I could, to stay out of the way. A very dear friend and former student, Dr. Michael Bever, to whom I owe my own introd…

Adult Realism and the State of This Union

By Louis A. Ruprecht

…In fairness, one thing that made the President’s speech seem flatter than most was the altogether welcome, and altogether adult, decision by the leadership of the two main parties to weave themselves together, thereby working against the endless intrusion of partisan shouting and handclapping on two sides of the chamber that tended to double the length of such speeches in the past decades. This was the very sort of thing that led Chief Justice Ro…

Size Matters According to New Study

By Louis A. Ruprecht

Scientists are committed to studying almo*]}*st everything; that is their virtue. Scientists are willing to say almo*]}*st anything—which is not quite as virtuous. The latest scientific salvo fired across the bow of religion concerns, of all things, the size of the religious brain. Here’s the storyline as reported in the media: “Study suggests ‘born again’ believers have smaller brains” (USA Today) “Study suggests ‘born again’ believers have small…

Cornel West: Do Not “Santa-Clausify” MLK Jr.

By Louis A. Ruprecht

…her, they created a daunting shadow of rhetorical magnitude. First and foremo*]}*st, by reminding us that King was a son, before he was a father, West articulated his own powerful conviction that each of us are joined to all others in the human family, links in a chain that connects a burdensome past to a better (but never perfect) future. West took the time to note with appreciation all the many persons and institutions and social forces that contrib…

Is Karen Armstrong Right? Was Religion Always About Belief or Not?

By Louis A. Ruprecht

…s argued about doctrinal minutae in the streets for sport. Armstrong, like most religious studies scholars, is an atheist. There’s nothing wrong with being an atheist but the suggestion that religion is really not about belief is just disingenuous. I don’t believe that God, if there is a God, cares in the least whether we believe he exists or not much less whether we get the theological details right or whether we are, in any sense, religious. But…

The Byzantine Bush Tell-All

By Louis A. Ruprecht

…learn what forms of behavior Procopius’s audience would likely have found most shocking. The variability of sexual tastes at the time is especially pronounced. But there are historical commonalities as well, abuses of power that are condemnable in any and every age. Here is one of Procopius’s more memorable passages: Justice was established in the market-place, and that too though she had once dwelt in the Palace, and there one could find salesro…