Posted in Uncategorized on Dec 3rd, 2009
If you’re a conoisseur of religious propaganda like I am, you quickly notice certain tropes. One of my favorites is the “insert god into non-god-related current event as tortured theological metaphor” trick, which pops up all the time. Today’s example is Beliefnet’s “Crashing God’s State Dinner,” which uses the antics of the party-crashing Salahis to [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Nov 19th, 2009
After a lot of reflection, I’ve decided not to wade into the controversy over the Fort Hood Massacre. Sure, shooter Nidal Hasan appears to have been a devout Muslim who shouted “Allahu Akbar” while he was mowing down his colleagues and who had deep respect for Anwar al-Awlaki, the spiritual adviser to the 9/11 hijackers, [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Oct 21st, 2009
All over the world, people love President Obama (and, by extension, us). This is perhaps most evident in his recent Nobel Peace Prize, but also is reflected in America’s inclusion in the 2010 FIFA World Cup, Swiss cooperation in the arrest of Roman Polanski, and the massive worldwide popularity of G.I. Joe: The Rise of [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Oct 5th, 2009
Writing in Time, author Bruce Feiler argues that President Obama should be taking political lessons from Old Testament hero Moses. He calls attention to the following three teachings: (1) “Sell the milk and honey” In other words, no matter how bleak things look, remind everyone that you were promised by a disembodied voice speaking to [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Aug 11th, 2009
It’s not just tea-partiers and Obamaniacs and birthers and astroturfies and soylent greens and death panels who are trying to hijack the health care reform process. Now religious groups are getting involved: A coalition of Christian, Jewish and Muslim leaders has launched a national campaign for health care reform, calling it a “fundamental religious issue,” [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on May 12th, 2009
Graduation speakers are always a tricky issue. The year I graduated college, they picked some speaker no one wanted to hear, and then shortly before graduation she died (or got sick, I forget which), and they replaced her with someone else no one wanted to hear. And yet, we all showed up, sat in the [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on May 7th, 2009
Today is the first Thursday in May, which means it’s the National Day of Prayer! NDP is, of course, the fourth-best holiday of the year, right after Mischief Night, System Administrator Appreciation Day, and National Corndog Day. I know what you’re thinking: shouldn’t National Day of Prayer be one of my least favorite holidays? Well, [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Apr 28th, 2009
US News and World Report has put together a special feature on the “10 Most Important Obama Faith Moments.” Of course they picked stupid ones like “Having Rick Warren pray at the inauguration” and “Luring Tony Dungy away from football to join the Faith Advisory Council” and “Smearing holy dirt on Joe Biden’s forehead.” Bo-ring! [...]
