Irony Repeats Itself: Reconsidering Reinhold Niebuhr in the Trump Era
For the third time in this young century, Reinhold Niebuhr is getting another splash of…
Read Morepbs
The Fragility of Our Reality: A Conversation with the Brain Behind PBS Miniseries on Neuroscience
When you get down to it, neuroscience is just brains studying brains. One upshot of…
Read More
“1913: Seeds of Conflict”: New Doc Explores Little-Known History of Palestine
In his 1967 book Israel: An Echo of Eternity, Abraham Joshua Heschel refers to “the jungle…
Read More
Rewriting the History of Catholic Schools in America
If you’re looking for a sure bet, here’s one: until this fall, the vast majority of US Catholics had never heard of Archbishop John Hughes. Then, in September, the Archbishop of New York, Timothy Dolan published an article…
Read MoreIndonesian Volcano Update: Yes, it’s a Religion Story…
Media coverage has focused on the science of eruption, but they missed much of the local story.
Read More
Whose God in America?
I must admit, I was pretty excited when I heard about God in America. My husband and I are big PBS fans. As the show proceeded, however, I became increasingly annoyed. We moved from the Franciscans to the Puritans, with John Winthrop ostensibly treating Anne Hutchinson as badly as the Franciscans had the Pueblos. But it seems there were no indigenous people at all in New England in those days—or else they and the Puritans got on extremely well.
Read More
The Brutality of the American Eden
Last week’s six-hour PBS documentary, God in America, wasn’t really about God in America. Nor was it about religions in America. Following a fairly conventional narrative in mainstream discourse (albeit not one adopted by the contemporary Christian right), the series…
Read MoreJust War Tradition v. David Brooks on 9/11 Trials
With the 5 Gitmo detainees believed to be behind the 9/11 attacks being tried in Manhattan, conservatives push for the label of “war” over “crime.” Just War tradition doesn’t agree.
Read More
Environmentalists Are Lousy Metaphysicians
Having abandoned its roots in art, the dehumanization of the world, and the metaphysical, environmentalism has made common cause with its natural enemies and arrived at a place where its holy grail is reducing carbon dioxide to 350 parts per million.
Read More