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Kosher Nukes: Israeli PM Consults with Radical Rabbi on Iran Strike

…inst Iran’s nuclear facilities has the pundits wondering if this a further signal of Israel’s intention to bomb Iran, or yet another bluff in a campaign to get the West to further tighten sanctions on Tehran. The Israeli government, in this view, has no intention of attacking Iran and starting another Middle East war, but it is willing to go to the brink to get the U.S. to act—and to act before the November elections.  The Rabbinic consultation st…

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Unpacking the Giglio Imbroglio

…d for his “phony religiosity.” Obama, though, let that roll right off his back. By contrast, conservatives are starting to portray Giglio as a victim. Which is, of course, another sign that the culture wars are not over.   *This post has been corrected to reflect Robinson’s role in the 2009 inaugural festivities….

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Mormons Take Even More Activist Message to DC Pride March

…say what opinions we should have. In Maryland, I’ve only seen one call for signature gatherers that went out over one congregation’s email list.  But even without formal LDS Church involvement in Maryland, you feel compelled to take a more political stance than the Salt Lake City marchers. Martin Luther King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail said, “We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people…

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Romney, Tisha B’Av, and LDS Temples

…g Benjamin, taught the people at the temple (see Jacob 1:17; Mosiah 1:18). Significantly, when the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ appeared to the Nephites in A.D. 34, He came to the temple (see 3 Nephi 11:1–11). The Prophet Joseph Smith taught, “The Church is not fully organized, in its proper order, and cannot be, until the Temple is completed, where places will be provided for the administration of the ordinances of the Priesthood.” The LDS.org w…

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Obama Administration Gives Free Pass for Faith-Based Groups to Discriminate

…which receives millions in federal funds, and requires all US employees to sign its Christian Statement of Faith and/or The Apostles Creed. World Vision’s president, Richard Stearns, has been an outspoken critic of ending what is euphemistically known as “co-religionist hiring,” and has a coalition of conservative faith-based advocates backing him. After Obama pledged on the campaign trail in 2008 to reverse the Bush policy, evangelicals were up i…

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The Gospel Church and the Ruining of Gay Lives: An Interview with Anthony Heilbut

…with the other. Is it an underlying straight assumption about wealth as a sign of masculine virility? Oh, that’s an excellent idea… I have two theories: One is the great dialectic in American culture between Jesus the meek and humble lamb and Jesus the warrior, the man’s man. In other words, is it the Jesus who appeals to the effeminate preachers and their female flock or the Billy Sunday-Billy Graham [version represented today by] Tony Evans? He…

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Is it Blasphemous to Describe Science as “Magic”?

…act that scientists themselves are using this vocabulary, he argues, “is a sign of the utility that these supernatural concepts still maintain” for describing our universe. The use of supernatural concepts to describe the Higgs boson has been hotly debated ever since CERN’s announcement. Over at io9, Dave Goldberg makes all the best arguments against it. The “God Particle” was coined by Leon Lederman in a book detailing how essential the Higgs is…

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Presbyterians Make Right Choice on Israel Divestment

…ey’re gravely concerned about Israeli policies in (choose your political designation) the West Bank/the Occupied Territories/Occupied Palestine, but they’re also aware that the situation is extraordinarily complex, and that they risk alienating Jewish allies—and even engaging in anti-Semitism—if they misspeak or misstep. Activists, meanwhile, are shrill. Right-wing “pro-Israel” activists decry any criticism of Israel as anti-Semitic, while left-wi…

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The Magic of the Higgs Boson Particle

…icists like Whitestone and Lederman doing the talking) we seem to revert to talk of magic and wizardry. I suspect that this isn’t merely a matter of scientists talking down to a lay audience, but is a sign of the utility that these supernatural concepts still maintain (even for physicists) for some of those very features of our universe that science has supposedly laid bare….

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‘Religious Freedom’: Constitutional Principle or Electoral Politics?

…. In some quarters the letter was treated as a reversal of position—even a sign of bad faith, or that the bishops had gotten to Sister Keehan and reeled her in. It would be fairer to take the letter at face value, as an acknowledgement that on close examination Obama’s suggested accommodation simply would not work—a reasonable conclusion given the self insurance issue and that it is still not clear whether the insurance companies would pick up the…

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