Search Results for:

VIPREG2024 today 1xbet promo code Sweden

Let The Sun Shine In: Marriage Equality Comes to Broadway

…r and Marriage Equality There are many risks in doing a production of Hair today because of the ways that society has changed; the play could easily come across now as camp or nostalgia. Yes, we are a nation that continues to wage war, which still creates indescribable tragedy in our contemporary lives. But with Iraq and Afghanistan, we “sacrificed” by going shopping, the bodies of dead soldiers were hidden from our television sets, and we allowed…

Read More

Religious Freedom Not Harmed by Tenth Circuit Decision in Utah Marriage Case

…Marriage Act. Like many of the district court opinions, the Tenth Circuit today rejected arguments that marriage equality infringes on the religious freedom of its opponents. Because, the court noted, it ruled that same-sex marriage is a fundamental right protected by the Constitution, its opponents cannot argue against it based on claims that legalizing it would result in infringements of religious freedom or create religious strife. The opinion…

Read More

What Do We Mean By ‘Judeo-Christian’?

…kely to appeal to many American Jews, whatever their political persuasion. Today, terms like “Judeo-Christian tradition” and the claim of American exceptionalism have become a staple of the rhetoric of presidential candidates. In the 2008 campaign, John McCain said, “The number one issue people should make selection of the president of the United Sates is ‘Will this person carry on the Judeo-Christian tradition that has made this nation the greate…

Read More

Apocalypse Now and Then: How a Biblical Genre Shapes American Politics

…theology that animates evangelical Christians today. Extreme moral dualism Today’s white evangelicals in the U.S.—along with many conservative white Catholics and mainline Protestants—imagine themselves to be the persecuted faithful, victims of state oppression in the mold of biblical apocalypses. While this might seem ludicrous to outsiders, it aptly captures their sense of the disorder of the last half century as they’ve been compelled to share…

Read More

Dilemmas of American Empire: Can Obama Pull Off a Game-Changer in Iraq, Iran, and Afghanistan?

…Natanz with a nuclear weapon until the Joint Chiefs rebelled against them. Today there is a serious possibility that the Netanyahu government in Israel will carry out the bombing option. If it does, the entire region could explode into a ball of fire. That’s the apocalyptic scenario. The hopeful one is a game-changer based on two or three years of sustained diplomacy. The U.S. could declare that it recognizes the legitimacy of the Islamic Republic…

Read More

Blood and Politics — Christian White Nationalism in the Age of Obama

…and they helped create a realignment of forces that continues to plague us today. How does that show itself today? Primarily in the anti-immigrant movement—the lobbyists, Minuteman vigilantes, and racist think tanks that support them. It is here that the idea that the United States is or should be a “White” country takes on the form of a policy issue. If you follow the discussion among anti-immigrant groups, the dominant discourse is about how the…

Read More

Welcome to the “Spin-od”: Conservatives Look to Halt Reforms on Divorce and Other “Family Matters”

…ring the synod, but it was possible to change pastoral practice to reflect today’s realities. … The new practices, it was claimed, simply fit better with the current situation of many people in the Church. But that wasn’t manipulation—it was the key purpose of the synod and the question Francis asked it to address. Most of what conservatives term “manipulation” was newly empowered progressive bishops pushing for change, something they hadn’t had t…

Read More

Rallies Honor Martin Luther King Jr.’s Support of Organized Labor

…ckelberry was one of the men who marched alongside King during the strike. Today, Mr. Nickelberry, 79, is still hauling Memphis’ garbage, as he has done for more than 55 years. I wrote about Nickelberry in September: Like his fellow sanitation workers back then, he heaved rusted cans over his head. Wet garbage and maggots leaked down his collar and the back of his shirt. There of riding the bus home and people complaining that he smelled because t…

Read More

The Protestant Mainline Makes a (Literary) Comeback

…hurch and community organizing in which we live.  Progressive Christianity today, by whatever name, is characterized by an ethos of egalitarian civility that makes it allergic to developing strong leaders. It works in a coalitional style and speaks in the voice of an improvisational ensemble, or as James Wind says, an always-evolving chorus. We don’t want anyone to presume to lead us or speak for us, and we tend to be reticent about our faith.  On…

Read More

The Left Behind: Why Are White American Christians So Racist?

…science, or really, just liberalism on many scores. To put it another way, today’s “Nones” might have been the loosely-affiliated white Christians of fifty years ago, balancing at least nominally those more invested in the social order. I can say as a matter of practical experience that as white American Christianity contracts, the people left behind in the pews are indeed those most committed to preserving the social order. Keeping tradition aliv…

Read More