Religion Dispatches
…Bible says. Now that Republicans in New York have raised several billion dollars to defeat those who turned toward marriage equality, we see the strength of conscience again. They are not raising this money just out of cruelty, although cruelty is its consequence; they are raising this money out of their loyalties, values, and meanings. We’re living through a change from the old overly materialist approach to politics, and emerging into a more…
Read More…ivate and religious schools to discriminate against students with taxpayer dollars. I had meant to write a goodbye post thanking both readers and the wonderful people at Religion Dispatches for all the support. But, I spent some time playing with the granddaughters, took a few days off kayaking with good friends. Then there were those rum slushies that my husband has been making, which he and I drink each night out on the deck as the fireflies dan…
Read More…al with the rise of Christianity in China. Investigators found billions of dollars worth of treasure in the vaults beneath a southern Indian temple. The Vatican is opening up its Secret Archives to reveal 100 previously unseen documents to the public. The documents cover the period of Pope Pius XII’s World War II papacy and the trial of Galileo. Speaking of Pius XII, a woman has claimed he miraculously cured her lymphoma, encouraging those in favo…
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…hierarchy and its allies in the Knights of Columbus have found millions of dollars to spend in one state after another opposing marriage equality, or its weaker cousin, the civil union. Leaders Without Followers The rhetoric our bishops employ in these campaigns is hardly pastoral. Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York, referred to same-sex marriage as “an Orwellian nightmare” and an “ominous threat.” He compared his state’s government to North Kor…
Read More…acknowledging that cuts would hurt to an even split on the question. These numbers, and the widening confusion they reflect, will come back to haunt the Democrats if and when they next propose a jobs program to help the economy get moving again. The reason why Democrats are losing, as Meyerson and others have pointed out, is that they have relented to using the Republican Manual of Economic Destruction, which holds, essentially, that the national…
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…on May 21, 2011. Those he managed to convince donated tens of millions of dollars from their emptied bank accounts, dropped out of school, and left their jobs in order to warn others of the impending destruction. On the morning of May 22, the credulity of Camping’s followers left them to be derided or pitied, and Camping himself allowed that he was “flabbergasted.” The apocalypse didn’t come. In the minds of many, they simply had been duped. But…
Read More…Link Executive Director Tom Minnery. CitizenLink has spent the millions of dollars it has raised over the years to fight against the rights of gays and lesbians. Their pet project is “True Tolerance” which advocates for the rights of bullies in schools. Okay, that’s not exactly a fair characterization. They are against bullying in schools, but they believe that bullies don’t need to be taught that gay and lesbian kids are just human beings like th…
Read More…orderlands meaningless to us. We have thousands of troops, and billions of dollars on the line, in Central Asia (composed of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the five former Soviet states of Central Asia, which include Uzbekistan). We have been at war in Afghanistan for a few days plus ten years, the longest war in American history. To which, apparently, the best attitude is jocosity. Or outright cluelessness. The billions spent there are billions tha…
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…he lauds. But would they? When I look at the faith-based takers of our tax dollars, I’m not seeing a bunch of Franciscans or Discalced Carmelites, I’m seeing social conservatives who are madly in love with laissez-faire economics—with radical individualism in the economic sphere, if not in personal life. But leave the historical problems aside. My worry is that Daly might succeed in having his historical exhumations lend credence to his personal a…
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…ence to the contrary, that the law was insufficient to prevent federal tax dollars from funding abortions. (The Hyde Amendment already does so.) As a result, he and the Bishops fought for an amendment that would result in restricting abortion coverage in the private insurance market, in their quest to restrict non-existent taxpayer funding of abortion coverage. After what they insisted was an inadequate restriction on abortion coverage eventually…
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