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Douthat’s Sinister Subtext

…language you speak, what god you worship, or how deep your New World roots run…But there’s another America as well, one that understands itself as a distinctive culture, rather than just a set of political propositions. This America speaks English, not Spanish or Chinese or Arabic. It looks back to a particular religious heritage: Protestantism originally, and then a Judeo-Christian consensus that accommodated Jews and Catholics as well. The subte…

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Jewish Past/Israeli Future: A Review of The Invention of the Jewish People

…ch Jewish establishment was quite critical of the book. From Brooklyn to Jerusalem Thus far, some US journalists have attacked Sand’s ideas—but there have been few full reviews—perhaps because the book is so scholarly and dense. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed piece on October 30, a critique of the book was embedded in an article by Evan R. Goldstein in the paper’s series “Houses of Worship.” The article focuses on Sand’s argument that most of the…

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What the Danish Cartoon Controversy Tells Us About Religion, the Secular, and the Limits of the Law

…that individual belief is understood in Muslim law to be fundamentally inscrutable and that its coercion is always thought to be inappropriate. What is of concern to Islamic law, he says, is “seduction” or the disruption of a living relationship. “What matters, finally, is belonging to a particular way of life in which the person does not own himself.” Saba Mahmood’s essay takes up several other difficulties with the conventional account of the ca…

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Monks With Guns: Discovering Buddhist Violence

…hough the cause of the violence is multilayered—owing much to corruption, drug trade, and corporatization—many monks also felt Islam was to blame. In their minds, the conflict was anchored to the larger discussion of religious violence: Muslims against Buddhists. One day after teaching an English class for Buddhist novices at a monastery a young monk came over and pulled back the folds of his robe to reveal a Smith & Wesson. I later learned that h…

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Can Atheists Simply Ignore Theology?

…learned treatises on the beauty of the Emperor’s raiment, and every major newspaper runs a section dedicated to imperial fashion… Dawkins arrogantly ignores all these deep philosophical ponderings to crudely accuse the Emperor of nudity. It goes on, but that is enough to capture its flavor. Since Myers first published it, this bit of satire has been invoked widely by atheists who want to quickly dismiss those who think atheist critics of religion…

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Which is the ‘Real’ Reality?: Doctor Who Part IV

…octor. But why would the Doctor have an adult relationship with French and English historical figures, but not the people he knows best? Is that how he keeps score? Or is he just uncomfortable being intimate with people he has emotions for? Or is the episode almost non-canon, with such comments intended to be dismissed as the perverse self-recriminations of The Doctor’s alter ego? Obviously an amorous reading would run contrary to the idealistic,…

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Evangelicals ‘Crossing the Tiber’ to Catholicism

…s College is a microcosm of the larger community of young believers whose frustration with the lack of authority, structure, and intellectualism in many evangelical churches is leading them in great numbers to the Roman Catholic Church. This trend of “Crossing the Tiber” (a phrase that also served as the title of Stephen K. Ray’s 1997 book on the phenomenon), has been growing steadily for decades, but with the help of a solid foundation of literat…

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A Pastor Takes on BP in New Orleans

…e of a guest who felt lucky to be there, but someone who belonged there—a true American worthy of sharing the podium with the leader of the free world. Obama acknowledged as much in his speech, referring to Nguyen’s role as a spiritual advisor and community organizer during Hurricane Katrina, when he sheltered hundreds of Vietnamese families in his church and remained with them during the floods until the last family was rescued. Now with the BP o…

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Egyptian Da Vinci Code Author Angers Coptic Christians

…he adds. Of course, history is littered with incidents of violence and corruption in the name of religion. It is ironic, rights groups argue, that the Coptic community in Egypt is taking a page out of fundamentalism’s book in attacking the author. One Egyptian writer, who asked not to be named as concern over a possible court case gains steam, says that Islamic conservatives were quick to attack Salman Rushdie over his Satanic Verses and death th…

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What is a “Religious Progressive” Anyway?

…e!’” O.D.O. barked, nearly upsetting their daily snort of Maker’s Mark and English breakfast tea while they lightly tossed a link from TPMDC at our head: Poll: Majority Of Americans Not Quite Sure What ‘Progressive’ Means. “Define it! Own it! Spare no expense! Send a telegram to the Soviets if you have to!” We briefly considered reminding Our Dear Overlord that the Soviets had been superannuated back when he was still in grade school. But we like…

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