Religion Dispatches
…it, and the next minute some one was helping me to the curb. I thought then, well, at least I did regain consciousness. Because, just as quickly, I might not have. It could have been fatal and I really thought about the second reason then. 2) Hajj is suppose to be a “once in a lifetime” thing. I decided after the accident, that I really needed to push my intentions up a notch and make the hajj. There was not sufficient time to do it for last hajj…
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…e,” he said. Dr. Yeomans’ criticisms are shared by other advocates for safe, legal, and accessible abortion. Sometimes referred to as “TRAP laws” (which stands for “targeted regulation of abortion providers”), these types of regulations require abortion providers to meet specific licensure requirements that differ from the requirements for other outpatient surgical facilities, like eye surgery centers, outpatient cosmetic surgery centers, etc. Pri…
Read More…hat more careful with what I say in the classroom since. Self-censorship is, I think, the way most LGBT Russians and their allies deal with the legal situation today. If it’s hard to find many instances of the anti-“propaganda” law being enforced in practice, everyone realizes that the potential is there. Those LGBT people who are publically out here show a heroic level of bravery. The law that passed in June—which is, I think, best explained as c…
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…s. And nobody can deny the convenience of ready access to information, maps, phone numbers, calendars, and social satisfaction that our reliance on technology provides. Technology is a tool, right? It doesn’t change who we are, right? It doesn’t blind us—it reveals reality by connecting us and showing us the world via our screens… right? Look, I know that our new imaginative, mediated work is doing good. I know people can feel a real sense of empo…
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…have made a religion out of understanding the distinctions between zones A, B, and C. But I was only staying in the East Village for a few months. Much was unfamiliar already: my new relationship, being unemployed, the neighborhood itself. So with the largest hurricane ever to threaten New York City headed our way, I just gave myself over to it. I knew it could not really satisfy my longing for comfort and order but it was the best thing I had….
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…t of cases, even with those of differing perspectives. Father James Martin, SJ, for instance, criticized LeMoine’s actions against Cihak and his family on both Facebook and Twitter, tweeting “If you deny the sacraments to those who favor same-sex marriage, you must also deny it to those who fail to forgive.” His Facebook page has spilled over with conversation—some of it heated, but most of it respectful—on the weight of Catholic teachings on sex…
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…might be for a child with loads of enthusiasm but rather limited talent for, say, football or acting. But as Jim’s arrests piled up for doing things like chaining himself by the neck with double kryptonite locks to abortion equipment, his father—his revered, remote, rageful father—dismissed him as a “damn fool.” And in the end it made perfect sense that the aborted man took murderous aim not just at an abortionist, but at a dad. It is no surprise…
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…totally, I see what you mean, because when I’m scared, I turn on the lights, phone a friend, or commit genocide. It is true that Izetbegovic was influenced by Islam; but, for him, Islam was no different than Catholicism was for many Poles, who reached out to a religious leader (the Pope) to advance a political agenda of liberation. Izetbegovic went to jail for his religiously-inflected activism, which isn’t surprising considering Yugoslavia was a…
Read More…ites, “made a series of costly financial, strategic, and political mistakes, that, in retrospect, all but assured the candidate’s defeat, given the revolutionary turnout tactics and tactical smarts of President Obama’s operation.” To wit: Team Romney was (as we all knew) far too timid in telling the candidate’s personal story—especially his faith and his service in his faith community. Team Obama had way better tech guys. Team Romney had a better…
Read More…ons of what exactly that Office is doing—a never-ending source of confusion, and even awe, among reporters, policy analysts and professors in Washington, DC.” DuBois has defended his work by claiming that government partnerships with faith-based organizations help serve the needy. Later that year, DuBois told a gathering in Colorado, “If your focus is first and foremost serving people in need, then there’s not a tremendous amount of time left to d…
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