Religion Dispatches
…week, using religious rhetoric to stir up the masses in support of another promotional event for the Glenn Beck media empire. Witness his exchange with David Barton of Wallbuilders on August 16: Beck: I think this is an opportunity to gather God’s people together and wake people up. And I just have this feeling that this is the beginning of something gigantic in this country, that it is spiritual awakening. What’s going to happen there will raise…
Read More…e is for white people,” or perhaps it’s the Tyler Perry phenomenon, or the latest salvo by Steve Harvey, “Act Like a Lady, Think like A Man.” The spate of over-the-top weddings like those of Star Jones and Juanita Bynum, both whom claimed God gave them their spouses, surely played a role. But both are divorced, one spectacularly. Bad theology is also to blame. The “waiting on the Lord” theme, being told to be like Ruth and wait until your Boaz fin…
Read More…like being asked to die for the telephone company.” It’s worth asking the latest wave of Know-Nothings if they’re prepared to do that. Even better, somebody should ask them if just how committed they are to the ideal of the free market. Because the other tension in the nation-state as it has developed is the twin definition of citizenship: on the one hand, citizens are free to participate in the political realm. On the other, they’re free to part…
Read More…lash out and hurt somebody: Normally I would think we could ride out this latest wave of nativism and racism, but there are two factors that make it more dangerous than usual. The first, of course, is the economy which looks like it’s not going to recover smartly thus giving this impulse more oxygen than it might otherwise have. The second is that the right wing demagogues have an entire industry now devoted to creating and nurturing these wedge…
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…ed attention. 6) Use social media. The UU media team took advantage of the latest in social media. Participants posted on Facebook and YouTube. They tweeted. They took photos and videos. The mass text alerts told people where to go and kept folks abreast of breaking news. 7) Ask for personal engagement and sacrifice. The UUA made a courageous and bold ask of supporters. People were asked to get to Phoenix in July and consider getting arrested. App…
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…Steven Greenhouse reports in the New York Times on forced wage cuts as the latest employment trend. The ongoing punishment of working people—forcing wage earners with middle-class incomes back into working poverty—is taking place even as our elites treat themselves to ever-sweeter luxuries. I won’t comment on Chelsea Clinton’s wedding to a hedge fund manager, or on Michelle Obama’s time away at Spain’s most expensive resort, except to say that one…
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In his latest attack on the Social Justice, Glenn Beck slams the work of James H. Cone and Black Liberation Theology. On the surface, what Beck says may be appealing; Cone does make people uncomfortable. With a black man in the White House and talk of a “post-racial” America, who wants to hear about lynching, of all things? Yes, it was horrible, but haven’t we put that behind us? Aren’t people who still want to bring “that” up just trying to stir…
Read More…. the dreaded “Ground Zero Mosque”) is still embroiled in controversy. The latest blocking strategy has been to apply for landmark status for the current building on the site. Echoing the Temecula Baptists, US Representative Peter King said, “It’s a house of worship, but we are at war with al-Qaida.” King also argued that it was a bad time for Muslims to build a mosque. “Right at this moment in history, it’s bad form to put it there.” Want to bloc…
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…s seem like lesser evils. So I wondered whether to acknowledge Robertson’s latest provocation. It bores me, and I feel cheapened even to think about it as I worry about one of my students who has not yet returned from a mission trip to Haiti. Still I could not resist clicking on a list of Robertson’s top ten greatest gaffes that I found in the blogosphere. It was amusing to ponder the rankings. Does Robertson’s feat of leg-pressing 2000 pounds (th…
Read More…arming, and human cloning” as subjects in which educators are required to “promote critical thinking skills.” It also requires “supplemental materials” to be used alongside textbooks in public school science class. Forrest and the Louisiana Citizens for Science lobbied fiercely against the creationist language, but, in the end, only three members of the House voted against it because they feared crossing Jindal, who is closely allied the Louisiana…
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