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A Truly Fearless Human Being: Rev. Howard Moody, 1921-2012

…Village Voice. In “Toward a New Definition of Obscenity,” Moody, who had by 1965 screened banned films in church and registered voters in the South, wrote that: For Christians the truly obscene ought not to be slick-paper nudity, nor the vulgarities of dirty old or young literati, nor even ‘weirdo’ films showing transvestite orgies or male genitalia. What is obscene is that material, whether sexual or not, that has as its basic motivation and purp…

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I Agree: Critical Race Theory is Indeed Incompatible With Southern Baptist Convention’s ‘Faith and Message’

…nchised can be dismissed as unbiblical. They could feel good about the anti-racist proclamation they made, and even express righteous indignation if accused of being racist. In all honesty, not knowing the state of their souls, they very well may not be racist. However, by silencing communities of color, they’re not only engaging in racist acts (if it quacks like a duck, etc), but they’re also fortifying the racism of Southern Baptist seminaries s…

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Richard Dawkins’ Atheist Academy of Unguided Truth

…se called “Biblical Archaeology,” in which the points of compliance and non-compliance between the biblical record and archaeology were pointed out; wide-ranging and fully scientific introductions to biological and cosmic evolution; and a Christian history course in which none of the horrors committed by the church, so thoroughly trumpeted by Dawkins and others, were skipped over or airbrushed. Then there was the king daddy of them all: Father Cav…

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Trayvon Martin and American Exceptionalism

…ins “Exceptional.” Here’s how America is Exceptional: as Joanna notes, a 17-year-old African-American boy, Trayvon Martin, is shot and killed with a bag of Skittles and an iced tea in his hands, by a white man with a gun on “neighborhood watch.” Trayvon’s trip to the 7-11 was not just a run to the store, but another statistic in the long arc of racialized violence in America. George Zimmerman, who shot Trayvon in his role as neighborhood watch cap…

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In Hamline Case, the ‘Free Expression vs. Religious Sensibilities’ Frame Obscures a Stark Reality About Higher Education

…when it comes to pay, benefits, leave, promotion, and job security. Divide-and-rule is not a new tactic, for it’s well known in the Indian subcontinent that the British pitted one local Raja against the other based on tribe, religion, or caste—among other factors. The same applies to corporations as they stoke divisiveness in society by indulging in performative activism. They misdirect the attention of people towards who said what and why and aw…

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Doubt v. Predator: A Vatican II Parable

…r children from harm—justify her means. On the surface Doubt is a torn-from-the-headlines story about the abuse scandals that have rocked the Church over the last decade. At its heart, however, Shanley’s story is a parable of Vatican II. It’s critical here to point out that Doubt is set in 1964, in the midst of the Second Vatican Council; in that context the story reflects the Church’s growing pains. Sister Aloysius is the old church, authoritaria…

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Why The Book of Mormon (the Musical) is Awesomely Lame

…om personal knowledge, I can tell you that many of the play’s zingers about 19-year-old Mormon “elders” fall on target. A surprising number of these Christian soldiers haven’t in fact read the Book of Mormon (“Another Testament of Jesus Christ”). Pairs of missionaries (“companions”) do often resent each other; sexual tension, homophobia, homesickness, and boredom strain the relationships of these co-workers/roommates. Many missionaries dislike the…

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Why Taxing the Rich is the Godly Thing

…e little problem with this scenario: Obama has surrounded himself with once-and-future high-income individuals who are themselves highly susceptible to supply-side dogma that says the rich must be curtsied to and coddled if the nation is to prosper. We should note that this is how savage inequality maintains its vampirish lease on American life: by replicating itself within the bloodstream of elites and would-be elites.   But the full weight of re…

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House GOP Hires Lawyer to Prevent Federal Recognition of Same-Sex Marriage

…ehner appears ready to go to great lengths, and the great expense of a high-power law firm, to try to score some cheap political points on the backs of same-sex couples.” I suppose Boehner can pander to the religious right and continue to defend “traditional” marriage, but I think it’s fair to ask why—when jobless rates continue to hover near 10 percent—which issue may be most important to God: how people arrange their intimate relationships, or h…

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There’s No Business Like the Bible Business: 200 Years of the ABS

…s, which did the actual distributing of the sacred texts. The ABS produced cheap, text-only Bibles, sold at cost and distributed through “branch societies,” and thus undercut competitors. If you wanted notes, commentary, or maps, you would have to look elsewhere; the ABS focused on sola scriptura, with the faith that the words alone, guided by the Holy Spirit, would effect transformations in the lives of individuals. If there’s one thing that Amer…

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