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Why "Pulpit Freedom Sunday" misses the point
It has become an exercise in free speech and a challenge to the federal government. "Pulpit Freedom Sunday," the birth child of the group Alliance Defending Freedom, is designed to challenge the 50-year-old Johnson Amendment (501 c 3), which prohibits tax-exempt charities from publicly endorsing or opposing a candidate for office or working on their behalf. On Sunday, October 7, pastors who choose to participate will stand in the pulpit and endorse and/or oppose candidates for office—and no doubt focus on the presidential candidates themselves.
Giving and receiving
The question isn't who gives more and who receives more at a given moment. It's whether the use of tax dollars serves the common good.
Daily patterns: Fall books: Reading habits
My daily reading is tethered to the rhythms of the sun. In the evening, there is the slow burn of the substantial book beside the easy chair, which I savor in small portions. Early mornings are marked by a different pattern.
Whose children?
Today’s Gospel lesson, though not a traditional baptismal text, embodies the spirit of the sacrament: the ones bringing the children to Jesus are not necessarily parents; they are “people” moved to care for these little ones. This choice of language leads us to ask, if the adults bringing the children to Jesus are not their parents, then who are they? Why do these men and women stand up to the disciples for the sake of children that are not biologically theirs?
Jordan tour: Our driver from Ramallah
In Jordan, reports are mixed as to just how good relations are between the Muslim majority and the Christian minority. What's clearer is that the stronger divide is between native Jordanians and the many Palestinian refugees.
The two locals we spent the most time with, our tour guide and our bus driver, represent both differences.
Monday digest
The daily digest posts return. New today from the Century: the editors on the 47 percent, Sam Wells reviews Jürgen Moltmann, more.
Ethics of Hope, by Jürgen Moltmann
Here’s the thing about Jürgen Moltmann. Almost everything he says, you feel you’ve read somewhere before. Now there could be two explanations for this. One, that he’s a creature of fashion: that, like everyone, he speaks out on the environment; on the analogy between the discourse on human rights and the relation to soil, sea and sky; on justice for the oppressed; on God’s coming future. Or two, that he’s a creator of fashion.
Vatican newspaper calls 'Jesus Wife' fragment a 'clumsy fake'
c. 2012 Religion News Service
(RNS) The Vatican's newspaper declared the controversial "Jesus wife" papyrus fragment "a fake" on Friday (Sept. 28).
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Man behind anti-Islam film 'Innocence of Muslims' arrested in Los Angeles
c. 2012 Religion News Service...
Tender ministry
Finally, Mom put the phone down. She took a large basin and placed our nicest guest towels in it. "Carol!" she yelled. "Let's go!"
Conflict on e-mail
Susan Nienber at Alban has some good thoughts about how not to communicate about conflict. But I'm puzzled as to why she frames her argument as the problems of e-mail in particular.
The NFL's predictable bad day
The NFL gambled on fans’ willingness to endure the replacement refs. It was wrong—a good development for whatever ethical margin a football fan might claim.
Jordan tour: Forms of imperfect government
One of our Bedouin drivers in Wadi Rum also served us tea and dinner at the campsite and stayed there with us. Later he shared his nargile with me while we sat around the fire.
Our tour guide informed me that this young man’s grandfather is a member of Parliament.
Questing for Understanding, by David B. Burrell
Burrell’s memoir is driven by Jung’s observation that the story of our lives is the story of our times, and it is our task to see how that is the case.
Patriarchs of Babylon
In the ninth century, Timothy I was a global statesman. In the 20th, Raphael Bidawid led a tiny denomination in the paranoid Iraq of Saddam Hussein.
U.S. Copts, Muslims decry film
Coptic Christian leaders in the United States distanced themselves from an anti-Muslim film that has sparked protests in more than 20 countries and denounced the Copts who reportedly produced and p...
At Judson Church, Howard Moody was a social justice leader
During his long ministry at Judson Memorial Church in New York’s Greenwich Village, ex-marine Howard Moody led religious assaults on tough social issues of the 1960s, ’70s and ’80s—openly aiding wo...
Jury finds 16 Amish guilty in beard-cutting attacks
Amish bishop Samuel Mullet has been convicted of federal hate crimes and conspiracy for exhorting followers to forcibly shear the hair and beards of those who opposed his breakaway Ohio sect....