Religion Dispatches
…nsubstantiated claims such as “when you give money to groups that not only promote contraception but also promote abortion in an integrated way, you actually drive abortion rates up, not down.” Since 2000, Alvaré has taught law and brought her own brand of cherry-picked data tendentiously linked to the supposed dangers of abortion and contraception wrapped up as concern for women’s health and well-being to the Robert George/Witherspoon Institute/N…
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…harist, it included a restatement of a prohibition of totally wheat-gluten-free hosts. This was often reported as something of a snub of the Celiac sufferers (or gluten intolerant) among the faithful. But reading through the directive and the supporting documentation, I was struck by their attempts to accommodate communicants who can’t tolerate some essential aspect of the rite. The bread for the host can be so low in gluten as to qualify for “glu…
Read More…a dormitory and besides going to class and a small part time job, I was a free bird. In Ramadan a free bird, flies high on the rituals of the month. I stood for 20 units or tarawih every night that I was fasting. Like the first time reading through the Qu’ran in Arabic on my own this was exhilarating. Somewhere around 12 or 14 units, I lost track of everything outside of the recitation and the ritual performance—the zone. It was even more intense…
Read More…opic: “We are Catholics. If someone wants to make another church, they are free to do so.” I think what he meant was, we men are the Catholics in charge and women who want to participate equally are free to form their own church. I can assure him on good authority that the process of forming new models of church is well underway with Catholic women serving the needs of the world. I can also brief him on the fact that some of the nuns with whom he…
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…plurality of ownership and decision-making, while resisting pressures from free-market fundamentalists to abandon any regulation or social principles: Right-wing dogmatism, with its sour-faced intolerance and fanatical faith in general precepts, bothers me as much as left-wing prejudices, illusions, and utopias. Today, unfortunately, we often find that a straightforward analysis of specific problems and a calm, unbiased consideration of them are b…
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…s or riding a bicycle so that you can charge your cell phone or blend your free smoothie, the spirit has that vibe, that playful spirit of early hope. Our skateboarder is ready to ride. Here you can see mushrooms growing out of logs injected with coffee grounds. Beautiful, edible oyster mushrooms. You can buy a nice meal in a glass dish, which is recycled. You can get a free recyclable cup to drink water out of a fountain. You can sign a climate r…
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…n’s bodily autonomy was emphasized, but as the saying goes “none of us are free until all of us are free.” It begs the question as to which women’s rights matter when US imperialism is responsible for dropping bombs on countries where women are using tent cloth as menstrual products because they’re displaced and don’t have access to what should be basic hygiene products or basic anesthetic during childbirth. There was little talk about the details…
Read More…ight has cost both sides bitterly. By focusing on the covenantal agreement between God and Abraham, both Muslims and Jews have lost sight of God’s inclusivity. As a result, for thousands of years the sons of Isaac have viewed the sons of Ishmael as potential enemies, and vice versa. Each side sees the other as the opponent in a battle for God’s single blessing. Here’s the catch. God did not just bestow one blessing. “So what?” hard-liners will say…
Read More…the Republic included “as he died to make men holy let us die to make men free,” when the more common version these days calls on us to “live to make men free.” Yet even with regard to the way military force has been central to what it means to be American, the president presented a new narrative, asserting that “peace and lasting security do not mean we are in a state of perpetual war.” One of the most important ways in which the tea party and…
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…hristians have merely been paying lip service to democratic principles and free elections, or whether they really believe in those principles and norms now that white Christians have become a demographic minority. This is all quite new—this reality of not being a majority white Christian country. We’ve gone from 54% white Christian to just 44% since Obama was first elected, or a drop of about 1% per year. Previous generations of white Christians h…
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