Religion Dispatches
…sly is. If we still had a Democratic Congress, we’d have a much fairer tax code (plus better health care, plus a thousand other things). But okay, that’s me. When I look at vast movements in history—fascism, socialism, American capitalism—they arise out of contexts that were, themselves, created by lots of large-scale circular movements which are impossible to trace precisely. Who knows, perhaps the collective weight of Occupy-style consciousness-…
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…physical activity, and—as a cartoon in ORU’s student newspaper pointed out—users can also game the system by, for example, attaching the band to a hyperactive squirrel. More have criticized the policy for seeming, as Rob Quinn puts it, more “Orwell than Oral.” Why, then, does ORU continue to require its students to buy the expensive fitness band? The plan is good for everybody, ORU Provost Kathaleen Reid-Martinez argues, because the devices are co…
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…against the Church, the Pope, and all the faithful by the whole world. The use of stereotypes, the passing from personal responsibility and guilt to a collective guilt remind me of the more shameful aspects of anti-Semitism.” After this mind-bending comparison, it was perversely refreshing to read a statement that appeared a couple of days later on the Catholic Web site Pontifex, deploying the Jewish people on the battlefield of this scandal in th…
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…ntracts to family friends; and how he ordered his staff to violate IRS tax code. Falwell’s been able to get away with such behavior partly because he doesn’t fear his board of trustees, which is essentially just a collection of close friends of the family. As noted above, Mark DeMoss, the one trustee who did speak up in disagreement of Falwell’s endorsement of Trump, was immediately removed from the board—a testament to Falwell’s Trumpian fragilit…
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…s well illustrated in the case of Peter Damian, an 11th-century bishop who promoted a harsh asceticism. Among his writings is a treatise that praises self-flagellation as an invaluable means toward repressing the body’s impulses. Sexuality was a deep concern for Damian, who believed that sexual acts were a sacrilege; celibacy and a renunciation of the erotic body was the proper road to Christian perfection. Damian’s hyperbolic language against the…
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…Springfield, Ohio, told US News & World Report: It’s really dangerous because I’m worried about violence here, because some people will believe that. And there are signs of people being harassed, including not even Haitians, but people who are perceived as Haitians … So there are real risks to real human beings here that are appalling. Strategies of religious racism Haitians’ revolutionary war for independence from the repressive French colonial…
Read More…rk to comfort racist fears or desires. In fact, it does the opposite. It causes extreme discomfort because it disrupts previously held racial and gender guidelines and thus rules of engagement. And, because of this, both Obamas will now face the predictable wrath of the likes of Bill O’Reilly and others who have been just waiting for the “politically correct” opportunity to put them both in their “places”—that is, in the back of the social-cultura…
Read More…to poke fun at Romney to sharpen those contrasts. And there’s no love lost between Huntsman and Romney, who are distant cousins. 8. And yet, there are undeniable similarities between the Huntsman and Romney, including the fact that both as governors launched health care plans they later disavowed. Does his early hemming and hawing about his own religion indicate a tendency to spin and squirm, or—even worse—flip and flop? It’s way too early to even…
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…not at the elite, but those on government assistance. It’s surprising because the lyrics betray the title, but it’s not shocking because the American Right has long distracted its rank and file from unprecedented income inequality and insufficient wages by directing their anger to those who are supposedly ruining America by living off its dream. Galvanize support for a trust fund billionaire by pointing to the people who are most vulnerable and l…
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…like this. I’m interested in the opportunity of space for black women because black men tend to speak for the black community—whether it’s visual arts, literature or politics. They tend to speak for both genders. To some degree, Black Lives Matter is shifting that narrative because you have queer black women at the forefront that are really the voice of challenging authority and protecting black bodies. With this exhibition, I wanted a space for…
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