The bishops in the United States have worked very hard to make the Catholic Church the safest institution for children in the entire country. They have systematically rooted out sexual predators, suspending them from the exercise of priestly ministry. Their determination in this regard has been steadfast and their intentions should be warmly and universally applauded. . . . Continue Reading»
October was not a month of especial cooperation in the global Eastern Orthodox communion. Protesting the appointment in March of an archbishop for Qatar by the Church of Jerusalem, the Church of Antioch withdrew its participation from all the Assemblies of Canonical Orthodox Bishops abroad. The Antiochian Patriarchate claims sole authority over the small Gulf state though at present it has no parishes of its own there. The assemblies affected by this decision include the canonical episcopal council in North America, which counts several Antiochian bishops among its officers. . . . Continue Reading»
Amid occasional stories of success (a personal friend who had previously been unable to afford health insurance can now afford a subsidized plan in California) the disastrous launch of the Affordable Care Act has revealed itself to be life-upending disaster for millions who are discovering thatthanks to the narrowest, and thus most easily negated of Grandfathering provisionspolicy holders who liked their insurance cannot keep their insurance. If they like their doctors and hospitals, they cannot keep their doctors and hospitals, either. . . . Continue Reading»
Benjamin Disraeli was one of the main architects of modern conservatism. He made it a successful political movement during the Victorian era. American conservatism is quite different from the English version. But we can learn from Disraelis success… . Continue Reading»
I do not possess the gift of healing, nor have I ever spoken in tonguesalthough when I was a high school student a charismatic Methodist friend of mine prayed that I would do so. Back then, in the 1960s, the charismatic renewal was still a new phenomenon in the mainline Protestant churches and virtually unheard of in the Southern Baptist Convention to which I belonged. Of course, the historic Pentecostal churches had been around since the Azusa Street revival of 1906, but the lines between them and other evangelical Christians were fairly hard and fast. . . . Continue Reading»
Among the many government shutdown stories that came over the wire in recent weeks was one about billionaire Houston philanthropists Laura and John Arnold, whose foundation gave $10 million to the National Head Start Association to keep the program for low-income children running after the shutdown forced it to close in six states… . Continue Reading»
The Washington Redskins football team is under great pressure to change its name to stop offending Native Americans. The ongoing coverage of that imbroglio got me to think about another commonly used epithet that demeans the most powerless among us, and yet remains in widespread use without attracting significant criticism… . Continue Reading»
Christians can learn from Jews. We can learn how to thrive in the secular world that no longer regards faith as central. So argues Rabbi Jonathan Sacks at the 2013 Erasmus Lecture. Speaking to more than five hundred people on the evening of Monday, October 21st at the Union League Club in New York, Sacks outlined a vision in which religious communities—Jewish and Christian—can function as creative minorities. . . . Continue Reading»
The well publicized problems of Obamacare are a sign of both opportunity and a danger for conservatives. The dysfunctions of Obamacare (the premium increases even more than the website problems) will give conservatives a wider hearing for their ideas on health care policy. But there is a danger: If conservatives fail to offer alternatives to the failures of Obamacare, the left will be able to offer single-payer as the only viable alternative to the problems caused by Obamacare. Whether or not conservatives can offer an alternative will determine if Obamacare is the high point of government control of medicine or just another step toward a complete public takeover… . Continue Reading»
This July, vigilantes snuck into bookstores and the public library in San Francisco, pasting stickers over the old heterosexual definition of marriage in the Oxford American Dictionary with their proposed new one: the formal union of two people by which they become partners for life. The vigilantes, under the revealing banner HACKmarriage, posted an online video depicting their clandestine activities, along with a downloadable sticker for any would-be imitators. … Continue Reading»