Religion Dispatches
…I fervently wish that Mr. Obama would say a bit more about the problem of cheap grace. Reminding us that people who work very hard for very little are not the abusers of cheap grace, but that others in well-feathered nests who are preaching sacrifice might be in real trouble on the cheap grace front. Obama cannot and should not condemn those in the electorate who buy into Romney’s “there will be showers of blessing” message, but he probably does …
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…the flag that wants them destroyed They saw their names listed in the telephone directory of destruction They were trained to turn the other cheek by newspapers that misspelled, mispronounced and misunderstood their names and celebrated when death came and stole their final laundry ticket” -excerpt from “Puerto Rican Obituary” by Pedro Pietri Then the lights went out and the stage lit up, and 60,000 white people finally started paying attention….
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…on, there are 1,300 fewer parishes, with an average of just one priest per parish; some 3,500 parishes have no resident priest. The sacraments are no longer as central to the lives of Catholics. The number of baptisms has declined from nearly 1 million to just over 700,000, and the number of marriages within the church has declined by nearly half. Only the number of Catholic funerals has held steady. And while the number of Catholics overall has r…
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…mpaigns in Maine, Maryland, Minnesota and Washington. In 2005, they printed 800,000 postcards in Canada “in a campaign that [argued] that the redefinition of marriage to include gay and lesbian couples would promote pedophilia, pornography and unsafe sex.” As Marianne Duddy-Burke of the LGBTQ Catholic organization Dignity USA commented in a press release, “The Knights are deeply invested in advancing a particular brand of Catholicism, and I am con…
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…n euros for the card to be activated for three days and to get three paper tickets. Up to the manuscript room, where I handed the ID card and one ticket to the clerk. She gave me a key to a locker, where I had to leave all my belongings except one pencil (not a pen, with which I could deface a manuscript) and a notebook. Reentering the reading room, I had to display my pencil and notebook to the clerk to get back my ID card and the ultimate prize:…
Read More…tinerary is set. I fly directly from San Francisco to Paris, and then from Paris to Jeddah, which is like the port city for hajjis. Apparently in the dream, someone was so anxious to show they had gone through Paris, they sort of took anything—because, clearly in the dream, no merit was ascribed to that particular choice. It was worse than my stop at the tourist kiosks near the White House, with big signs “T-shirt 3 for 10 dollars.” In America, an…
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…of the West, or to recognize that war in Bagdad is no less war than war in Paris. Such self-criticism, it seems, will not be quick in coming. Two weeks after the Charlie Hebdo attacks, French President François Hollande proclaimed a set of sweeping educational reform measures; he called them the “great mobilization of the schools to the [secular] values of the Republic.” These measures, reported by Le Monde and elaborated in detail by education…
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…ther bound to them. Saint Sebastian rolls his eyes. *** A story is told of Paris in 1290 that the Chronicle of Jean de Thilrode relates thusly: A certain Jew living in Paris had a Christian serving girl from whom he bought for ten pounds a consecrated Host. She her-self in truth presented it to her master, which done he placed the host on a table and had other Jews join him, saying, “Are not these Christians fools to believe in this Host?” Taking…
Read More…d of this year. France: Mayor Celebrates 2000 Same-Sex Couples Marrying in Paris In spite of the fervent opposition to marriage equality by France’s La Manif Pour Tours and its American allies, Paris Mayor Anne Hildalgo this week declared herself “delighted” that 2000 same-sex couples have been married in the city since the marriage equality law took effect in May. Australia: Independent Territory Set to Pass Marriage Equality Law Last year, Austr…
Read More…on organized a meeting of the emerging leaders of the religious right at a Dallas “Freedom Rally,” where, according to Huckabee, Robison realized the political power of conservative Christians and “would later be a part of a small circle of conservative evangelical leaders who would meet with Ronald Reagan and find him a man of principle and a patriot.” Religious right leaders helped organize a second meeting in 1980, after Reagan clinched the GOP…
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