Sunday, July 30, 2006

James Luther Adams: God

Mike Mallory, contributing to UU-Leaders Digest, quotes James Luther Adams' definition of God:
God (or that in which we have faith) is the inescapable, commanding reality that sustains and transforms all meaningful existence. It is inescapable, for none can live without somehow coming to terms with it. It is commanding, for it provides the structure or the process through which existence is maintained and by which any meaningful achievement is realized. (Indeed every meaning in life is related to this commanding meaning that no one can manipulate and that stands beyond every merely personal preference or whim.) It is transforming, for it breaks through any given achievement, it invades any mind or heart open to it, luring it on to richer or more relevant achievement; it is a self-surpassing reality. God is that reality which works upon us and through us and in accord with which we can achieve truth, beauty and goodness. It is that creativity which works in nature and history, under certain conditions creating human good in human community
Something to ponder for those who are searching.

Tuesday, July 25, 2006

Clyde Grubbs: Deeds, not Creeds

Clyde Grubbs has a short but good discussion about why that slogan is a spiritual guide and not a social action imperative.
How do we understand "deeds not creeds?" Is this a narrow call for everyone to be involved in the work for social justice? While working for social justice is a good thing, for religious liberals it must arise from and be an expression of our spiritual lives. It can not be a substitute for a spiritual life. Doing justice work must be soul work. ...

Sunday, July 23, 2006

Mainstream Baptist: Towards a Definition of Progressive Faith

Dr. Bruce Prescott, Executive Director of Mainstream Oklahoma Baptists and President of the Oklahoma Chapter of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, on his Talk to Action, thinks progressive faith has at least ten characteristics. It is conscientious, chastened, hopeful, strong, humble, growing, questioning, dialogical, active and interdependent.
There is a strong consensus within the Talk to Action community in opposition to the forms of Christian Reconstructionist, Dominionist, and Christian Nationalist faith that are taking over the public square in our country. We agree that there is an eternal hostility between democracy and theocracy.

Are any forms of faith compatible with pluralistic democracy?

How much common ground do we share when asked to define faith in a way that encourages prophetic speech in the public square while respecting separation of church and state?

A tip of the hat to Faith of the Free.

Saturday, July 22, 2006

Note From the Executive Director of the Rockridge Institute

Bruce Budner, Executive Director of the Rockridge Institute - a non-profit, non-partisan think tank dedicated to strengthening our democracy by providing intellectual support to the progressive community - writes about what's going on there. They're especially looking forward to their upcoming Handbook for Progressives.

The Rockridge Institute is home of Senior Fellow George Lakoff who has a number of publications including Don’t Think of an Elephant! and his new Whose Freedom? The Battle Over America’s Most Important Idea.

Wednesday, July 19, 2006

The state of marriage in Massachusetts

Has the ability of gays and lesbians to wed in Massachusetts destroyed the institution of marriage in that state? Bruce Wilson says, to the contrary ...
... Divorce rates in the US have been declining steadily since the the early 1980's. Massachusetts has shared in the trend and traditionally has had a divorce rate considerably lower than the national average. In fact. for several years now the Commonwealth has had the lowest divorce rate of any state in the union.

In 2004 the Massachusetts divorce rate, at 2.2 per 1,000 residents per year, was considerably lower than the US national average rate for that year, 3.8 per 1,000. Indeed, it was lower than the national average rate for 1950 (2.6 per 1,000) and even approached the national rate of 1940 (2 per 1,000).

In 2003, total divorces in Massachusetts declined 2.1% relative to 2002. But in the first two years of legal same sex marriage in the Bay State, Massachusetts showed a more rapid decline and will very likely hold on to its title as the US state with the lowest divorce rate in the nation. The field is hotly contested -- divorce rates have fallen dramatically in the last few decades.

The institution of marriage in Massachusetts, as measured by the rate of divorce, has not been healthier in at least half a century regardless of dire predictions of Christian Right leaders and Catholic Bishops. But the states that have taken aggressive action against same sex marriage, have not done nearly as well during the two year period of legal same sex marriage in Massachusetts. ...

A tip of the hat to Street Prophets.

Friday, July 14, 2006

John W. Dean: Triumph of the authoritarians

Former Nixon White House counsel John Dean, in a piece in the Boston Globe, doesn't understand Republicans and contemporary conservatism.
... Today's Republican policies are antithetical to bedrock conservative fundamentals. There is nothing conservative about preemptive wars or disregarding international law by condoning torture. Abandoning fiscal responsibility is now standard operating procedure. Bible-thumping, finger-pointing, tongue-lashing attacks on homosexuals are not found in Russell Krik's classic conservative canons, nor in James Burham's guides to conservative governing. Conservatives in the tradition of former senator Barry Goldwater and President Ronald Reagan believed in ``conserving" this planet, not relaxing environmental laws to make life easier for big business. And neither man would have considered employing Christian evangelical criteria in federal programs, ranging from restricting stem cell research to fighting AIDs through abstinence. ...

Thursday, July 13, 2006

Slate: Why we're fatter

Always being on the lookout for reasons being overweight isn't totally my fault, Slate provides 5 possibilities:
  • Inadequate sleep
  • Chemical contamination
  • Heating and air-conditioning
  • Smoking cessation
  • Medications

Slate: Same-sex marriage setbacks may not be all bad news for gay rights.

An article on Slate by Richard Thompson Ford, who teaches at Stanford Law School, says in part
... How to reconcile the growing support for equal rights for gay Americans with the seemingly hardening opposition to gay marriage? It certainly suggests that homophobia is only part of the explanation for the widespread resistance to same-sex marriage. A lot of the resistance is less about sexual orientation than about sex difference. In other words, it's not about the difference between gay and straight; it's about the difference between male and female. By this logic, conventional marriage doesn't exclude gay couples from a special status reserved for straights; it excludes women from a special status reserved for men—that of husband—and excludes men from a status reserved for women—that of wife.

Does this sound purely semantic? It's not. ...

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Evolution said to be "controversial" to some on Ohio Board of Education

Americans United reports
Some members of the Ohio Board of Education appear to be preparing for another assault on the teaching of evolution in public schools, says Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

Last month, board member Colleen Grady reportedly urged the Board of Education’s Achievement Committee to consider giving 10th-grade science teachers guidance on teaching evolution and other “controversial” issues such as global warming, cloning and stem-cell research. ...

Me and Myspace

A couple of months ago, I set up an account on Myspace to see what it's all about. I've been kinda wary about getting a bunch of "friends" I don't know, so I've turned down a number of invitations when I couldn't identify the person. But I'd like to have readers of my blog as friends. If you've got a Myspace account, please go to http://www.myspace.com/paulwilczynski if you'd like to be my Myspace friend :)

Mongolians mark 800th anniversary

According to The Boston Globe,
Mongolians celebrated the 800th anniversary of Genghis Khan's march to world conquest yesterday with festivities that mixed commercialism with appeals to nationalism.
Can you believe it? Wow. How time flies.

Street Prophets talks to Barack Obama

Street Prophets interviews Senator Barack Obama about his speech at the Call To Renewal convention.
Q: What were you trying to accomplish with your speech?

A: I have gotten frustrated at times in observing the public debate, seeing the degree to which the conservative right has been able to dominate the conversation about religion and politics, and to determine what it means to be a good Christian. Part of the reason they've been able to do that because progressives have not engaged the faith community as effectively as we could.

What would you like to see come out of the speech?

To some degree the speech has already accomplished what I intended, which is a conversation, a robust and fruitful one, hopefully. One of the points I was trying to make in the speech is it's not enough for progressives simply to say "leave your religion at the door" or "keep it private" - because that's not what conservatives do. I was hoping to start a conversation about how could we go deeper into a discussion about what religious values might mean in our public policy, and how can we do that in a way that respected diversity and tolerance. ...

Anglicans & Episcopalians - it's power, not sex

Robert Bruce Mullin, SPRL Professor of History and World Mission and Professor of Modern Anglican Studies at The General Theological Seminary, New York, says what's going on in the Anglican Communion has nothing to do with sex and everything to do with power.

Tuesday, July 11, 2006

Labor Blog: Gutting Labor Rights for Nurses

Labor Blog writes ...
Today [July 11, 2006], nurses will rally across the country to protest likely decisions by the National Labor Relations Board that would declare most Registered Nurses (RNs) to be "supervisors" under the law and therefore stripped of any protection under labor law. If these rulings go as expected, mosts RNs could be fired at will if they say anything positive about unions or are even suspected of being in favor of unions.

The core of the problem derives from the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act which denies labor rights to "supervisors", meaning that anyone deemed a supervisor can be fired at will if they say anything nice about unions or try to take action to support unions in their workplace.

Once upon a time, it was generally understood that a supervisor was someone who had some degree of power to hire and fire those below them, but the in a series of decisions, the courts and NLRB have expanded the meaning of supervisor to mean people who, because of their expertise, direct the actions of other employees in some way. ...

That just ain't right. Tip of the hat to jspot.org.

Public Expression of Religion Act (H.R. 2679)

Findlaw describes this bill, which is intended to protect public displays of religion by disallowing the payment of legal expenses to organizations which oppose such displays.
Recently, Rep. John Hostettler (R-IN) introduced the Public Expression of Religion Act of 2005 (PERA). PERA enjoys the support of forty-five other sponsors (all Republicans save one), and of the American Legion. James Madison, however, must be rolling over in his grave.

PERA is a creative attempt to forestall Establishment Clause attacks on public displays of religion - from statues and plaques of the Ten Commandments placed at courthouses, to government placement of religious symbols such as crosses and menorahs in public areas. Indeed, PERA's language goes so far that it could even protect government-sponsored sectarian prayers from Establishment Clause challenge.

If enacted into law, PERA would forbid awards of damages, and awards of attorneys' fees in cases involving the Establishment Clause. As a result, such lawsuits would end, at most, in injunctions - and plaintiffs' lawyers would have to accept the cases on a pro bono basis, or not at all.

Americans United is one of the many organizations opposing this bill.
“This bill is a punitive measure clearly designed to scare Americans from participating in church-state cases,” said Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United. “It would have a chilling effect on every citizen’s right to access our courts and would be particularly harmful to religious minorities.”
Even though there are references to the year 2005 in the title, the information provided was published in June, 2006.

Monday, July 10, 2006

Telegraph: Silence modern music in church, says Pope

According to an article in the Telegraph,
The Pope has demanded an end to electric guitars and modern music in church and a return to traditional choirs. The Catholic Church has been experimenting with new ways of holding Mass to try to attract more people. The recital of Mass set to guitars has grown in popularity in Italy; in Spain it has been set to flamenco music; and in the United States the Electric Prunes produced a "psychedelic" album called Mass in F Minor. However, the use of guitars and tambourines has irritated the Pope, who loves classical music. "It is possible to modernise holy music," the Pope said, at a concert conducted by Domenico Bartolucci the director of music at the Sistine Chapel. "But it should not happen outside the traditional path of Gregorian chants or sacred polyphonic choral music." ...
My sister, who is an active participant in a "gym mass" in a suburb north of Chicago, is not pleased.

Friday, July 07, 2006

NYT: For Gay Rights Movement, a Key Setback

The New York Times has a good article on the ruling by New York's highest court against gay marriage.
When Massachusetts became the first state to legalize gay marriage in November 2003, gay rights advocates imagined a chain reaction that would shake marriage laws until same-sex couples across the nation had the legal right to wed.

Nowhere did gay marriage seem like a natural fit more than New York, where the Stonewall uprising of 1969 provided inspiration for the gay rights movement and where a history of spirited progressivism had led some gay couples to envision their own weddings someday.

Yesterday's court ruling against gay marriage was more than a legal rebuke, then — it came as a shocking insult to gay rights groups. Leaders said they were stunned by both the rejection and the decision's language, which they saw as expressing more concern for the children of heterosexual couples than for the children of gay couples. They also took exception to the ruling's description of homosexuality as a preference rather than an orientation. ...

It's becoming very apparent that the effort to legalize gay marriage - now - is a losing battle. Coming from Massachusetts, I hope that it stays legal here, but I have my doubts.

Western Union does its part to stop terrorism

Associated Press via Yahoo News reports...
Money transfer agencies have delayed or blocked thousands of cash deliveries on suspicion of terrorist connections simply because senders or recipients have names like Mohammed or Ahmed, company officials said.

In one example, an Indian driver here said Western Union prevented him from sending $120 to a friend at home last month because the recipient's name was Mohammed.

"Western Union told me that if I send money to Sahir Mohammed, the money will be blocked because of his name," said 36-year-old Abdul Rahman Maruthayil, who later sent the money through UAE Exchange, a Dubai-based money transfer service. ...

Yep, I definitely feel much safer. Especially after this:
In one case, a couple in Sacramento, Calif. was thwarted from purchasing a treadmill on a financing plan, simply because the husband's first name was Hussein...
Wouldn't want Hussein to get in shape ... that might be dangerous.

Thursday, July 06, 2006

George Lakoff's new book

George Lakoff's got a new book called Whose Freedom?: The Battle Over America's Most Important Idea. Amazon describes it by saying, in part
“Freedom” is one of the most contested words in American political discourse, the keystone to the domestic and foreign policy battles that are racking this polarized nation. For many Democrats, it seems that President Bush’s use of the word is meaningless and contradictory—deployed opportunistically to justify American military action abroad and the curtailing of civil liberties at home. But in Whose Freedom?, George Lakoff, an adviser to the Democratic party, shows that in fact the right has effected a devastatingly coherent and ideological redefinition of freedom. The conservative revolution has remade freedom in its own image and deployed it as a central weapon on the front lines of everything from the war on terror to the battles over religion in the classroom and abortion.

In a deep and alarming analysis, Lakoff explains the mechanisms behind this hijacking of our most cherished political idea—and shows how progressives have not only failed to counter the right-wing attack on freedom but have failed to recognize its nature. Whose Freedom? argues forcefully what progressives must do to take back ground in this high-stakes war over the most central idea in American life.

Boston Globe: Leaders oppose bid to ban gay marriage

The Boston Globe reports ...
Taking on Governor Mitt Romney and the Catholic Archdiocese of Boston, 165 prominent business and civic leaders are publicly calling for the Legislature to reject a proposed constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

The group, which includes leading bankers, healthcare executives, lawyers, and leaders of the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce, has purchased an ad in The Boston Globe that says the amendment would ``take away rights." It urges lawmakers to "move on to other important issues like strengthening the economy, improving our schools, and protecting our neighborhoods." ...

Good for them. They've got the courage to speak out for equality.

NYT: Homeless Alcoholics Receive a Permanent Place

Here's something in Seattle conservatives are just gonna hate (New York Times - free registration required) ...
Rodney Littlebear was a homeless drunk who for 15 years ran up the public tab with trips to jail, homeless shelters and emergency rooms.

He now has a brand-new, government-financed apartment where he can drink as much as he wants. It is part of a first-in-the-nation experiment to ease the torment of drug and alcohol addiction while saving taxpayers' money. ...

... The building's critics are particularly incensed that residents do not have to stay sober. The Seattle Times, in 2004, editorialized that government should insist that the residents quit drinking in order to live there.

The whole point, of course, is that they're not going to stop drinking, no matter how much anyone insists that they do. This way, at least they have a relatively safe place to live (and for many, that won't be too long of a time given their health conditions).

It must be a great feeling for some people to sit up on their high horses and criticize those whose lives don't quite measure up.

Monday, July 03, 2006

UUWorld: What would Jefferson and Adams do?

The Rev. Dr. F. Forrester Church, senior minister of the Unitarian Church of All Souls in New York City, hypothesizes on what John Adams and Thomas Jefferson would have to say if they were to pay a surprise visit to the 21st–century United States. I'm particularly interested in Adams, of course, because he's buried in the basement of my church.
.. in 1798, Alexander Hamilton had no difficulty convincing Adams that a National Fast Day would honor and galvanize his more conservative Federalist political base. Indeed it did. Raising a host of traditional black cockades, hundreds of New England preachers seized this governmentally sanctioned opportunity to pronounce French and Jeffersonian infidelity a demonic double threat to the future of America's Christian Republic.

Later in life, Adams looked back ruefully on his decision to promote a religious event for political gain. He went so far as to claim that it cost him the presidency. For one thing, it left the plausible impression that he had buckled under pressure from Presbyterian Church leaders, who urgently were calling for the president to proclaim a day of national worship. Declaring a National Fast was like poking a stick into a nest of hornets. In alarm, Dissenting Christians (Baptists, Methodists, and the like) howled that Adams was compromising church–state separation. For sound religious reasons, they came out in droves to support Jefferson, the more secular candidate. "Nothing is more dreaded than the national government meddling with religion," Adams concluded in 1812, years too late to save him from his ill–calculated experiment in Christian governance.

I suspect, for all his piety, that Adams would want our current president to grasp this insight, too.

Good to see that, back then, Christians voted in favor of separation of church and state. I agree with Church - learning from our past can be a Good Thing.

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