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A Review of Raised Right

Sometimes it’s hard to understand why young people deviate from the conservative mentalities of their parents during their young adult years, but Raised Right: How I Untangled my Faith from Politics offers an explanation for the switch. Recounting experiences of faith and politics through childhood into young adult years, Raised Right is an early memoir, chronicling Alisa Harris’ leap, like that of many young people, across the political divide from right to left… . Continue Reading »

Down on the Farm

The U.S. Department of Labor has proposed new regulations that will address child labor on farms. Among the proposed rules, paid child workers (these could be kids employed by their own families) under the age of fifteen would not be allowed to operate tractors, combines, ATVs, or most other power-driven equipment without special certification. No one under eighteen could work around grain elevators, feed lots, or livestock auctions. And no texting while tractoring; no iPod or walkie-talkie use, either… . Continue Reading »

Breaking Bad Liturgical Habits II

As I remarked late last year, the introduction of the third edition of the Roman Missal and the new translations of the liturgical texts offer the entire English-speaking Church an opportunity to correct some bad liturgical habits that have developed over the past four decades. The point of these corrections is neither liturgical prissiness nor aesthetic nostalgia; there is no “reform of the reform” to be found in lace surplices, narrow fiddleback chasubles, and massive candles. The point of correcting bad habits is to celebrate the Novus Ordo of Paul VI with dignity and beauty, so that Holy Mass is experienced for what it is: our participation in the liturgy of saints and angels in heaven”where, I am quite confident, they don’t sing treacly confections like “Gather Us In.” … Continue Reading »

The Potomac and the Tiber

Oscar Wilde once observed that “the Catholic Church is for saints and sinners alone. For respectable people, the Anglican Church will do.” Newt Gingrich would have made a pitiable Anglican“or Mormon, for that matter. As a Catholic, however, he fits right in. Catholics are all too familiar with frailty, and in fact the central Christian idea of redemption by Christ presupposes a need for such redemption… . Continue Reading »

All American Muslim: An Open Letter

Dear Mr. Caton, As pro-life and pro-family Christians, we support and applaud the purposes of the Florida Family Association (FFA) as set forth in your organization’s mission statement: to “educate people on what they can do to defend, protect and promote traditional, biblical values.” We are writing now, however, in a spirit of respect and brotherhood, to urge you prayerfully to reconsider your position on the question of the television show All American Muslim on The Learning Channel (TLC)… . Continue Reading »

Savoring a Good Year

2011”my first full year at First Things, and my first year as Editor. During the quiet days after Christmas I found myself paging through the year’s issues. There’s a lot to savor. Here are some of my favorites. “The Man-Made Messiah” (January). It’s the Lubavitcher rebbe, Manachem Mendel Schneerson whose followers stand outside the “mitzvah tanks” (the RV style trucks that blare klezmer music) on the eve of major Jewish holiday, asking passers-bye, “Are you Jewish?” … Continue Reading »

Toward a Sensible Discussion of Empire

Some time ago, a friend remarked that it is scarcely possible to have a sensible discussion of empire these days. What follows is not that discussion, though I hope it is sensible. It is a set of truisms and assertions, some so obvious that it is telling that they have become controversial. My aim is to sketch the contours of a sensible discussion to come… . Continue Reading »

A Review of Anna Geifman’s Death Orders

In her recent book, Death Orders: The Vanguard of Modern Terrorism in Revolutionary Russia (Praeger, 2010), Anna Geifman, a professor at Boston and Bar-Ilan universities traces the universal patterns of twentieth- and early twenty-first century terrorist movements through a psychohistorical lens that yields some surprising conclusions. She begins by arguing, for instance, that Russia is the birthplace of modern terrorism… . Continue Reading »

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