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Jordan tour: A Christian town
On Saturday I broke off from the tour group and went to Fuheis, a town of 20,000 outside Amman....
The New Religious Intolerance, by Martha C. Nussbaum
In The Clash Within, Martha Nussbaum explored the capacity to entertain the other as key to a democratic society. Now she considers angry resistance to the other, bringing her usual erudite analysis and intense moral passion.
Jordan tour: Borders, bagpipes, orphan girls
Our first full day in Jordan was spent mostly at sites of Greco-Roman ruins: we visited two cities of the ancient Decapolis, Gadara (now Umm...
Serious faith
When I was a child, I read only baseball box scores. More recently, when Marilynne Robinson has a new book I immediately order it.
What happens in between?
Sometimes preaching in a lectionary church is like being Philip in Acts 8—the Spirit plucks us up and drops us where ever she darn well pleases. It is necessarily this way, certainly. Between the thematic requirements of the seasons of the church year and the sheer length of the four Gospels spread out over 156 Sundays, there is no way we can read all four in their entirety in three years. So, we skip stuff. Especially in Year B, as we try to mash the shortest Gospel, Mark, together with the other Gospel, John, together in some supposedly coherent way.
Links? Links.
Here are some things I read recently but didn't get around to blogging about.
Breaking Bad
Each time Walter White gets away with something, I can't help cheering him on—while also shuddering at his depravity and my own complicity.
Synthetic immortality
Neuroscientist Kenneth Hayworth is opposed to death, and he thinks he has a solution.
Poll: White working class voters are still looking for a candidate, and still religious
c. 2012 Religion News Service...
Loving the stranger in an election season
The other morning during my run I listened to Krista Tippett’s 2010 interview with Lord Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of Great Britain.
That’s Why God Made the Radio, by The Beach Boys
The new Beach Boys record doesn't always work, but when it does it dials in the group's age of innocence, filtered through years of experience.
Providers as employers
Ted Goins, president and CEO of Lutheran Services Carolinas, spends a lot of time focused on the Affordable Care Act’s regulations for providers of nursing care. But the health-care reform law also affects LSC is another way: as an employer.
Health care up close: What else the Affordable Care Act does
Most people know only about the ACA's consumer-focused elements. Faith-based care providers are preparing for the law's other provisions as well.
U.S. Muslims, Copts appeal to rioters to drop violence
c. 2012 Religion News Service (RNS) Muslim and Coptic Christian leaders in the U.S....
Jesus’ wife? Questions about a Coptic fragment
In an announcement from Rome that seemed scripted by The Da Vinci Code novelist Dan Brown, a Harvard professor stated that an ancient scrap of papyrus mentions Jesus’ wife....
Coptic text mentions Jesus' wife
The New York Times, the Harvard Gazette, The Huffington Post and other media outlets are breaking the news that Karen King, a scholar well known for her work on the phenomenon usually referred to as “Gnosticism,” has come into possession of and has been studying a Coptic papyrus fragment which is likely to be authentic, dates from around the 4th century, and has Jesus mention his wife.
Leaving on a jet plane that will be in the air for many hours
Tonight I leave for a 10-day press tour of Jordan, sponsored by the Jordan Tourism Board....
Feeling threatened
Someone who tries to control through words has been trying to contact me for years. While he acts as though he is interested in saving women from violence, the way he does this is through distorting the truth, triangulation, manipulation and, lastly, by exerting the power of place: showing up to my congregation.
Beyond Our Means, by Sheldon Garon
Sheldon Garon contends that Americans lack moral teaching on wealth, public policies that encourage saving, and a cultural ethos that nurtures thrift.
Long Lost Ghosts, by Emily Hurd
Working with producer John Abbey (who has played with Daniel Lanois and Ray Davies), Emily Hurd turns in a soulful, tender album that recalls the best of Lucinda Williams and Shawn Colvin.