Monthly Archives: December 2008
Nuns smell success in fresh batches of snickerdoodles
By RNS Blog Editor — December 17, 2008
c. 2008 Religion News Service CLEVELAND _ The kitchen inside the convent of the Sisters of the Holy Spirit smells like heaven coated in cinnamon sugar. The nuns are busy this time of year, with the help of a few spry seniors, producing miracles at the rate of 48 to a sheet, 10 racks at […]
COMMENTARY: The Grinch that didn’t really steal Christmas
By Tom Ehrich — December 17, 2008
(UNDATED) The Grinch stealing Christmas this year is a Hydra bearing two heads: corruption and incompetence. While retailers watch tapped-out customers stay away, headlines relate all-time duplicity records like Illinois Gov. Blagojevich’s alleged plan to sell a Senate seat and investment guru Bernard Madoff’s alleged $50 billion Ponzi scheme. We also read unsavory additions to […]
Episcopal head says faith leaders should play prophetic role
By Daniel Burke — December 17, 2008
c. 2008 Religion News ServiceWASHINGTON _ Episcopal Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori on Tuesday (Dec. 16) called on religious leaders to play a prophetic role in the public square but criticized faith groups that use government money to forward a sectarian message.“The idea that faith-based groups should have special entree to government funding just makes […]
Jefferts Schori twitches
By Mark Silk — December 16, 2008
Speaking today at the National Press Club, Episcopal Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori took a stand against the Bush doctrine of government-funded faith-based social service provision: “The idea that faith-based groups should have special entree to government funding just makes me twitch,” said Jefferts Schori, who leads the 2.2 million-member Episcopal Church. “It makes me […]
No GLBT child left behind
By Mark Silk — December 16, 2008
Brody’s on the case of education secretary nominee Arne Duncan’s support for a gay-friendly high school in Chicago. Lest you thought the culture wars were over.
Waiting for Lefty
By Mark Silk — December 16, 2008
Now that the right has gotten in its licks at Newsweek, comes the left with its own lament that Lisa Miller did not see fit, or have the wit, to include its advanced perspectives on biblical views of love and marriage. Over at Religion Dispatches, there’s Catholic feminist theologian Mary Hunt and U.C.C. activist Peter […]
Tony Blair reflects on his newest title: teacher
By Christ Herlinger — December 16, 2008
c. 2008 Religion News Service NEW HAVEN, Conn. _ To the chapters of a life of a one-time prime minister and now freelance diplomat, add one more: Mr. Blair Goes to Yale. Fresh off his first year as a guest lecturer on faith and globalization at Yale University, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair got […]
Muslims scramble to get halal meat into customers’ hands
By Nyier Abdou — December 16, 2008
WOODBRIDGE, N.J. _ On a chilly evening splashed with rain last week, Atif Nazir left his office in Newark and drove to Woodbridge, where a strip of South Asian and Middle Eastern shops sell everything from jewelry and curry to saris and sweets. Nazir, who volunteers with the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) in […]
RNS Daily Digest
By RNS Blog Editor — December 16, 2008
c. 2008 Religion News Service N.M. diocese votes to stay in Episcopal Church (RNS) Episcopalians in New Mexico have voted to leave a conservative umbrella group and “reaffirm” their commitment to the Episcopal Church rather than join a new rival Anglican province on U.S. soil. The Albuquerque-based Diocese of the Rio Grande on Thursday (Dec. […]
Lumps o’ Coal?
By Mark Silk — December 15, 2008
Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D) and her husband “have bought 300 shares of U.S. automaker stock — 100 for each of their three children — and will make them part of their Christmas gifts” (AP).
Ipse dixit McCurry
By Mark Silk — December 15, 2008
Mike McCurry, one of the most decent guys in American politics, offers his take on the Democratic religious awakening. Take note Dan, Fred, Sarah et al. Update: My response to Pastordan’s screed.
Writ
By Mark Silk — December 15, 2008
Twenty years ago, shortly after we had moved from Milton, Mass. to Decatur, Ga., my eldest son returned from a day at Decatur Presbyterian Kindergarten and asked, “Daddy, What’s the bobble?” “What’s the bobble?” “You know,” he said. “Jesus loves me. This I know. For the bobble tells me so.” “Oh,” I replied, sagely. “It’s […]
Jihadis
By Mark Silk — December 14, 2008
In one of those anniversary pieces that sometimes attribute more significance to what is being remembered than is deserved, Peter Baker suggests in today’s NYT that the impeachment of Bill Clinton 10 years ago marks the beginning of the vendetta-like conflict that characterizes politics in the nation’s capital: Indeed, except for brief interludes, Washington in […]
Sacred Canopy?
By Mark Silk — December 14, 2008
Andrew Sullivan rightly corrects Camille Paglia for claiming that marriage is a religious concept that should be left in the hands of religious institutions while the state should concern itself solely with civil unions and the legal rights appertaining thereunto. (The truth is that marriage was always the business of the civil order; the religious […]
