Opinion
COMMENTARY: Time to get a grip
By Phyllis Zagano — January 28, 2009
(UNDATED) The sudden storm over Pope Benedict XVI’s lifting the excommunication of four schismatic bishops reignites the slander that the Catholic Church-or the pope himself, or God forbid, all Catholics-is rife with anti-Semitism. Somehow a comment by one of the bishops-he doubts the gas chamber murders of millions of Jews were a “deliberate policy of […]
Religion by Region
By Mark Silk — January 28, 2009
Gallup has surveyed Americans for religion’s importance and broken the results up by state. Here’s the map: So what’s the explanation? Says Gallup: The question of why residents of some states (e.g., Mississippi and other Southern states) are highly likely to report that religion is an important part of their lives, while residents of other […]
Where’s that Summer youth thing?
By Mark Silk — January 28, 2009
Howard Friedman over at Religion Clause has noticed that the fiscal stimulus bill includes $100 million for what’s been known as the faith-based initiative, and also that Rep. Susan Davis (D-CA) has proposed an amendment to increase that to $500 million. The money’s slated for Health and Human Services’ Compassion Capital Fund, whose purpose is […]
Roma locuta denuo
By Mark Silk — January 28, 2009
The man once known as God’s Rottweiler justifies giving something for nothing: “I undertook this act of paternal mercy because these prelates had repeatedly manifested to me their deep pain at the situation in which they had come to find themselves,” the pope said. “I hope my gesture is followed by the hoped-for commitment on […]
Social Conservatives under the bus?
By Mark Silk — January 28, 2009
The barons of the GOP are longing for a new Haley Barbour to head the RNC, writes Alexander Burns on Politico, and on his account what that means is someone consummately competent at the care and feeding of the apparat. Oh to be able to party like it was 1993-97! But it’s worth bearing in […]
COMMENTARY: Hubris and chutzpah
By Tom Ehrich — January 27, 2009
(UNDATED) What a hard week for hubris! You couldn’t make up this stuff. Last week, a square-jawed financier who bears an eerie resemblance to Superman was shown the door at Merrill Lynch. It seems that John Thain, the financial giant’s toppled head, downplayed material information while hawking his firm to Bank of America last fall. […]
Muslim Outreach
By Mark Silk — January 27, 2009
There’s plenty of commentary in the offing on Obama’s interview with Al-Arabiya–here’s Klein’s early guide to it–but I want to call attention to just this exchange on President Bush’s War on Terror. Q President Bush framed the war on terror conceptually in a way that was very broad, “war on terror,” and used sometimes certain […]
The Unexcommunicated
By Mark Silk — January 27, 2009
David Gibson’s post on Benedict’s welcoming the Lefebvrists back into the fold is a must-read. Tiniest of quibbles: David ends with the famous tag, “Roma locuta, causa finita.” To which I’d respond with the famous Yogi’s, “It ain’t over till it’s over.”
The Agenda
By Mark Silk — January 26, 2009
So what does the “Come Let Us Reason Together” agenda consist of? Four items. The most important in the realm of religious politics is what has come to be called “abortion reduction.” The idea is that pro-choice and pro-life folks can jointly support various measures to reduce abortions short of making them harder to obtain. […]
Togetherness
By Mark Silk — January 26, 2009
Robby Jones, who runs Public Religion Research, is up on Religion Dispatches this morning with a staunch defense of Third Way‘s “Come Let Us Reason Together” memo, in which he played a leading role. Robby directs his guns at the criticism the document has gotten from the religious lefties at Religion Dispatches and elsewhere, whom […]
The Church and the New Administration
By Mark Silk — January 25, 2009
An old ditty goes: Three things the pope does not know: What the Dominicans are thinking, What the Jesuits are doing, And how many orders of nuns there are. It’s a big and messy church–the biggest and the messiest–and if there are some things about it that elude the pope, there are assuredly many that […]
Ixnay on ExicoMay Itycay
By Mark Silk — January 23, 2009
And so, in the dead news zone of early Friday evening, the “Mexico City policy” has been, as promised, reversed. International groups that provide abortions or information on obtaining them will now get federal money. Even if that were to result in a net decline in the number of abortions (via better information on birth […]
Not on Our Soil!
By Mark Silk — January 23, 2009
It’s worth bearing in mind that opposition to relocating the Guantanamo prisoners to the mainland may have less to do concerns about security than with fear of a kind of infection. Take this statement from Diane Gramley, president of the American Family Association of Pennsylvania: I don’t think the average murderer or rapist hates all […]
