Religion Dispatches
…that universe, since our heroes were representatives of a federation of many planets, was getting along. Star Trek was about overcoming petty differences in the presence of a universe too large and too full of mystery for squabbling. It was, at its core, about creating a society. Society, Freud wrote in Civilization and Its Discontents, rests on a dose of healthy repression. This leads me to another point. The golden ages of Star Trek have thrive…
Read More…wyers defended the Dover school board in Kitzmiller v Dover. If Jones has any brains at all – and I’m not saying he does – he’ll get on the phone to the ACLU right now, begging its attorneys to take his case. What’s so incredibly stupid about all of this is that it seems like the community couldn’t have more bungled the handling of this raging bigot. Now, Jones – who is obviously one of the biggest spotlight-seeking jerks out there – will be made…
Read More…” The Washington Post reports this morning that Democratic Senators, on a phone call yesterday with White House senior advisor David Plouffe, argued against adopting the Bishops’ position. My source says it’s “not a done deal” yet, but expected action from the White House within a week. UPDATE: Another womens’ rights advocate tells me that she has “no reason to think” that the Obama administration feels it “owes” the Bishops for health care refo…
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…s to sum it up with a catchy refrain (played, he says, some fifty times at the APEC dinner): We’ll occupy the streets We’ll occupy the courts We’ll occupy the offices of you Till you do The bidding of the many, not the few We are the many You are the few As we mark the two-month anniversary of the Occupy Movement, the gift of an anthem seems more than fitting. Now everybody sing… with aloha….
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…w are you going to announce it over social media if you don’t have a smart phone? And smartphones: they are helpful, but they are also limited. I’m working with some of my guides to develop what’s called a WisePhone, and it’s smarter than a smartphone. What are some of the features of the WisePhone? You won’t lose it anymore because it won’t be influenced by gravity, so it won’t fall down the cracks of your couch. It will also be able to tweet or…
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…” Ward believes “folks need to be held accountable for their racism. Too many people are hearing this coded rhetoric and deciding that the real problem with the economy must be folks of color, immigrants, and the Jews.” During the last period of Patriot and militia growth in the mid-1990s, Ward witnessed this coded racist rhetoric being tested in the margins of the right-wing media, though it has since moved into the mainstream. In the past year I…
Read More…ged people to think twice. A Church spokesman said: “We don’t want to see anyone leave the Church, especially people who have been struggling with any aspect of their life. “It’s extremely important that our members read what leaders have said, and do not rely on other sources or interpretations or what people think they have said,” Eric Hawkins said in a statement. Ireland: Same-sex couples begin marrying Same-sex couples began to get legally mar…
Read More…for just a few minutes in one of them. Or sat on a street corner in Ohio. Anywhere in Ohio. And eavesdropped on an Obama canvasser. I mean, I spent 45 minutes phone-banking the parking garage of a lowly San Diego field office with four children under nine years old hopped up on Doritos and doing laps around my folding chair, and even under those suboptimal circumstances I could tell right away that Obama’s data was even better than it was in 2008…
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…k about this, please.” He struck a chord, and people did think about it. Many, like The Cut’s Mia Mercado, highlighted the irony of a childless man scolding those without children. My phone went wild with calls from animal lovers, queer friends and childless Catholic couples as well. An estimated 1.1 billion people belong to the Roman Catholic church. But even many of those who aren’t Catholic consider the pope’s words influential or have concerns…
Read More…ff from his family—his wife and children—now, and for the eternities? Can any human being bear so much? Can this religion we love do any better? As members of the LDS Church prepare for one of the Church’s worldwide General Conferences this weekend, Bryan’s friend Jahn hopes Church officials will offer stronger, more compassionate guidance and leadership on LGBT issues. Jahn remembers that it was a year ago this weekend that Elder Boyd K. Packer g…
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