by John Allen reports, in the National Catholic Reporter, that religious freedom has emerged as “the signature issue” for the Synod of Bishops of the Middle East: It’s only day one of the Oct. 10-24 Synod of Bishops for the Middle East, but already its signature issue has come into focus: Religious freedom, seen as the cornerstone [...]
Read the full postAuthor Archive for richardgarnett
In the Washington Post, Damon Linker (author of “Theocons”), proposes a “religious test” for all political candidates: Instead of attempting the impossible task of abolishing faith from the political conversation, we need a new kind of religious test for our leaders. Unlike the tests proscribed by the Constitution, this one would not threaten to formally [...]
Read the full postPerry has, in his usual measured and thoughtful way, discussed the analogy that some have proposed between the controversy over the convent at Auschwitz, on the one hand, and the Cordoba Project near Ground Zero, on the other. I think there’s a bit more to the analogy than he does, but I’d like to put that [...]
Read the full postOn a recent plane trip, I read Gilbert Meileander’s Neither Beast Nor God (buy it here), which is a succinct examination of the ideas of human and personal “dignity.” He writes (among other things): I doubt whether we can understand dignity well without at least a modest anthropology — without some notion of what it [...]
Read the full postReaders of my “other” blog, “Mirror of Justice,” know that I am very interested in cities, and in questions — particularly moral, spiritual, and anthropological questions — about urban design and planning. And they know that I am a big fan of the work of my friend and colleague, Philip Bess. Here, thanks to Public [...]
Read the full postThe brilliant Christian sociologist, Don Browning, who was a dear friend and mentor to so many Christian scholars (and others!), passed away during the night of June 3. R.I.P.
Read the full postMy friend Paul Horwitz has a review up, at the Concurring Opinions blog, of David A. J. Richards’s book, “Fundamentalism in American Religion and Law: Obama’s Challenge to Patriarchy’s Threat to Democracy.” (Interesting title.) Paul opens with this:
When you read the words “This is a provocative book” in a review, you know you’re in the presence of a mixed compliment. On the one hand, the critic will praise the book for saying something new, interesting, and potentially valuable about an important topic. On the other, it signals that the critic thinks there is something deeply flawed, wrong, or misguided about the book, and has reached for polite language to damn it with faint praise.
Read the full postI was delighted to receive in the mail the other day my copy of Steven Smith’s latest book, “The Disenchantment of Secular Discourse.” Run (or, double-click), don’t walk, to get yours. As one of the back-cover blurb-ers (ahem, me) puts it, “[t]his book presses us to look harder at closely held beliefs and to question [...]
Read the full postHere is an op-ed of mine, which ran this weekend in the Wall Street Journal, in which I offer some thoughts about the religious composition of the Court, how it might have come to be what it is, and whether it matters.
Read the full postA fascinating op-ed, in The New York Times, by the often-fascinating Stanley Fish, “Does Reason Know what it is missing?” Here’s a bit (presenting Habermas): What secular reason is missing is self-awareness. It is “unenlightened about itself” in the sense that it has within itself no mechanism for questioning the products and conclusions of its [...]
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