I’m working my way through Windsor , and I must say, Anthony Kennedy has never been worse—sophistry, casual matter-of-fact demonization, unclear basis for the decision, vague and repetitive phrasing, and a nauseating pretense of caring oh-so-much about how our federalist tradition . . . . Continue Reading »
Matthew Franck at NRO provides the best brass-tacks but fair and clear summary of what the two Supreme Court decisions, Windsor v. U.S. and Hollingsworth v. Perry actually did today. Also on NRO is Hadley Arkes’s more alarming interpretation. . . . . Continue Reading »
In a press release today, the Catholic Bishops led by Timothy Cardinal Dolan and Salvatore Cordileone call the Court’s DOMA ruling “tragic” and also lament that it failed to uphold Prop 8: Today is a tragic day for marriage and our nation. The Supreme Court has dealt a profound . . . . Continue Reading »
Today the Supreme Court wrongly decided both marriage cases, but the decisions were not as bad as they might have been. The Court declined to declare same-sex marriage a fundamental right and left the future of marriage policy for individual states to decide. Justice Kennedy wrote for a 5-4 . . . . Continue Reading »
I actually think there are reasonable people on both sides of the same-sex marriage debate. Finally, the biggest thing wrong with Kennedy’s opinion is that its unhinged moralism—based as it is on a conception of dignity or personhood that’s has no real constitutional . . . . Continue Reading »
The opening to Justice Antonin Scalia’s powerful dissent in the DOMA case, U.S. v. Windsor : This case is about power in several respects. It is about the power of our people to govern themselves, and the power of this Court to pronounce the law. Today’s . . . . Continue Reading »
A few Fridays back, President Munib A. Younan of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) spoke to the LWF’s Council in Geneva about rising persecution of Christians in the Middle East , urging Christians there to remain as a witness to others. “We are seeing a global rise in extremism,” . . . . Continue Reading »
“2013 marks the centenary of the birth of one of the greatest theologians of the twentieth century, Thomas F. Torrance” who believed that “modern western theology . . . has been trapped in an obsolete, dualist mindset that detaches Jesus Christ from God, worship and mission from . . . . Continue Reading »
“The ‘Edict of Milan,’ whose milleseptuacentennial (so to speak) is being marked this year,” says George Wiegel in today’s column , “wasn’t an edict and wasn’t issued at Milan. Still, its enormous impact on the history of the Church and the West is well . . . . Continue Reading »
Yes, the Supreme Court struck down DOMA today, in U.S. v. Windsor . Kennedy was consistent. 5-4, what else. Hadley Arkes, in a piece from a few months ago , reminds us why the act was passed (85 to 14 in the Senate and 342 to 67 in the House) back in the hoary days of 1996. You know, . . . . Continue Reading »
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