Gender and Sexuality

Why the ACA is the Most Important Women's Civil Rights Bill Since the 19th Amendment

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In the last year, attempts have been made in the US House of Representatives and the state of Arizona to defund Planned Parenthood. “Personhood bills” have been introduced in the same time frame in Virginia, Oklahoma, Mississippi and Colorado seeking to ban both birth control and abortion. Bills were also recently introduced in Georgia and Tennessee to criminalize miscarriage, potentially making it a capital offense. And who can forget Virginia’s effort to force medically unnecessary vaginal ultrasounds on females with the temerity to seek medical care? The ACA may be the most important piece of civil rights legislation effecting women since we gained the right to vote in 1920.

Culture

Are Jews the Smartest 'Race'?

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… Jews have a sense of themselves as a people who are intellectually superior. There is some statistical (and now genetic) evidence for arguing this point, but the factual basis for such a contention is probably more a function of culture plus the social legacy of Jews being a minority group that has had to scramble to make a living because they were denied access to land.

art

Visuals for Healing: Janice Fried's Meditative Art

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Janice Fried is a figurative illustrator based in New Jersey. Together with author Caroline Myss, she created a card deck of affirmations called “Wisdom for Healing.” She gets responses from people all over the world who have been touched by her illustrations in the collection. Some therapists have reported using her images for group sessions; others with illnesses use the images for daily meditation.

Christianity

If You're Not in Trouble for the Gospel You Preach, Is It Really the Gospel?

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You can hear about the vengeful and rather unmerciful God talked about on hundreds of radio stations across America, according to Bishop Gene Robinson who spoke at this year’s More Light Presbyterian Dinner during the Presbyterian Church USA General Assembly last week. That’s the side of God that Rabbi Michael Lerner so vividly describes as “the Right Hand of God.” But if you try to talk about the all-loving, all-merciful, overly-expansive side of God, especially one that accepts GLBTQ people… the “Left Hand of God,” well then you’re going to be in big trouble! The openly-gay Episcopal Bishop Robinson, over whom the Anglican Church has been “in chaos” for the last number of years, quipped that we should not be surprised when preaching the gospel gets you into trouble since Jesus made it very clear in his words, actions, and in his death, that trouble would follow when you truly followed his example.

Politics & Society

Today, I'm Coming Out in Favor of BDS (Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions Against Israel)

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Five years ago, I visited the East Jerusalem home of a Palestinian family I’d never met. It was an attempt at dialogue — an attempt, for all of us, to meet with and better understand the other. We were on opposing sides of an ever-expanding equation, and were supposed to be enemies. This was the working assumption upon which we were simultaneously operating and trying to smash. That much was clear.

General News

Why Eckhart Tolle's Evolutionary Activism Won't Save Us

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Eckhart Tolle’s books The Power of Now and A New Earth have not only sold millions of copies and been translated into dozens of languages but they’ve earned him the title “the most popular spiritual author in the [United States]” by The New York Times. He’s gained worldwide popularity amongst the masses and widespread admiration from movie stars, celebrities and famous musicians. Annie Lennox of the Eurhythmics said that he “has some kind of special quality that I’ve never seen before.” One student of his work asked in an online forum, “has he appeared in your dreams as well?” Oprah included The Power of Now in her 2000 book club, helping to launch it to the number one spot on the NYT book list a few years later.

General News

The State of a Nation + A Great "I Am"

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Fourth of July just passed and on the Sunday proceeding the holiday each year the Rector of my church reads the Declaration of Independence. In truth, usually I find it boring, laborious, and sometimes a conflicting hybrid of church and state. This year I felt something unfamiliar–sadness.

Culture

Thoughts on Germany's Circumcision Ban

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During my wife’s first pregnancy, we made the decision not to learn the sex of the child before birth. There were many reasons for this decision: the purity of discovery at the moment of delivery; an effort to prevent family and friends from inundating us with gender-defined baby gifts before the little one had even emerged; a Shalom-Auslander-like superstition that knowing would somehow invite a divinely-orchestrated disaster. However, the truth is that one motivation outweighed all others, at least for me: a terrible fear that our child would be a boy. It was a fear stemming from the fact that, as committed Jews, I knew we would circumcise him. And I also knew this: we desperately didn’t want to do so.

General News

Why Is Sheldon Adelson Donating Millions to Romney? NYT: "His Disgust for a Two-state Solution to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict."

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During the height of Newt Gingrich’s 2012 presidential campaign, the Sheldon-Adelson-backed Republican candidate caused waves when he called the Palestinians an “invented people” and declared that the Palestinian Authority was only interested in Israel’s destruction. Why did Gingrich express such extreme views late last year on a matter that, at the time, was not central to his campaign? Simple: those are not Gingrich’s views, but the views of Sheldon Adelson, who at the time was writing ten-million-dollar checks to prop up the Gingrich candidacy. On Sunday, a New York Times editorial wondered aloud why Adelson is now pumping staggering sums of money into the campaign of his second choice, Mitt Romney. The answer is, itself, staggering:
The first answer is clearly his disgust for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, supported by President Obama and most Israelis.

General News

POWER TO THE PEOPLE: Israel's Social Justice Protests Are Back as Thousands Block Main Highway and Confront Police

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Daphni Leef — who last summer sparked the largest social protests in Israel’s history when she set up a tent along Rothschild Boulevard — attempted to reignite those historic protests on Friday by again setting up camp (along with hundreds of fellow protesters). However, in stark contrast to the relatively accommodating stance police took toward the tent protests last summer, the authorities yesterday responded violently and with intentional symbolism as a mass of riot police beat and dragged Leef across the boulevard before arresting her.  They also forcefully prevented demonstrators from occupying the site where Israel’s protests began in 2011. Saturday evening, approximately 7,000 Israelis took to the streets to protest Leef’s brutal arrest and to begin anew last summer’s massive protests which, at their peak, drew nearly 500,000 Israelis into the streets. The tone was markedly confrontational, with protesters chanting “Returning Power to the People” as they swarmed city hall, blocked one of Israel’s main highways and at times overwhelmed police, some of which were joined by elite Special Forces units. Haaretz interviewed Barak Cohen, one of the protesters injured by police, whose anger was shared by many in the streets:
“We came to create a confrontation, not to stand across from them,” Cohen said.