Drug prohibition is the biggest failed policy in the history of our country. I know that is a strong statement, but once more people realize the unnecessary harms and disasters this policy has inflicted, they will surely start to agree.
2012
The Difference Between Holy and Nice: The Religious Counterculture
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Polite. What could possibly be more antithetical to the heart of religion than the cool reserve of social propriety implied by that word? We’ve all seen it—the chilly, respectful friendliness; the ginger embrace that somehow reminds us of our separateness; the newcomers ignored at an Oneg Shabbat or coffee hour. We try to solve the problem through deputizing official badge-wearing “welcomers” or offering trainings in “hospitality” and, while some progress is sometimes made, the congregation is rarely transformed by these ex post facto measures into a community as religiously loving as the one described by Jasleen.
2012
Privacy and Personhood in a World Without Mystery
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It will not do merely to complain about the widespread and outrageous invasions of privacy that citizens of the developed world constantly suffer, nor to legislate against them one by one. If we really want to fix the privacy problem, we have to identify the underlying shift in society’s attitudes towards what it means to be a person.
2012
Rethinking the Doctrines of the Trinity and the Holy Spirit
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I was sitting on the balcony of a high-rise hotel in Southern California. The Pacific Ocean sparkled under a smog-free sky. A rabbi we’ll call Sol was enjoying the view with me. “Sol, we’ve become good enough friends now that I can ask you something kind of personal, right?” I asked. “Sure. Anything.” “What do you think of Jesus? I’m not asking that as a test question or as a prelude to an evangelistic presentation,” I explained. “I’m just curious.”
2012
All We Have in Common: Youth Dialogue Offers a New Vision for Israel/Palestine
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If we truly want peace, we must highlight and strengthen solutions to the conflict that instead seek to build thoughtful relationships between Palestinians and Israelis. Programs that bring together Jewish Israeli and Palestinian youth offer such a solution.
2012
Levinas, Hitlerism, and New Atheist Revisionism
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In the immediate aftermath of September 11, 2001, it became fashionable to view religion primarily as a source of strife. Future historians may view the rise of an intolerant new antireligious movement, New Atheism, as part of the generalized overreaction to the horror of September 11—an overreaction that also included the use of torture and mass detention, the abandonment of trial by jury, and the misguided American invasion of Iraq.
Articles
Obeying a Higher Law: Making the Case Against Drone Warfare
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Who has died or been wounded by unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs)? Who is being surveilled? Where might drones be used in the future? In this powerful book, Medea Benjamin shows that drones are no different from land mines or weapons fitted with depleted uranium: they are extremely unsafe for civilians and they do not, in fact, differentiate between “noncombatants” and “combatants.”
Articles
Unitarian Universalism and the Story of Forrest Church
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Forrest Church’s initial interest in religion was mainly geared toward avoiding the draft as a conscientious objector. But what began as a dodge became a calling that was as much intellectual as religious, and resulted in a theology based on a belief in communal responsibility. In Dan Cryer’s Being Alive and Having to Die: The Spiritual Odyssey of Forrest Church, we learn that the Unitarian Universalist minister was hardly a paragon of old-fashioned virtue. Yet he urged parishioners to believe in compassion, love and service, and then practiced what he preached.
Articles
The War of Lies
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Thirty years ago this week, the Israeli army crossed into Lebanon and started the most stupid war in Israel’s history. It lasted for 18 years. About 1500 Israeli soldiers and untold numbers of Lebanese and Palestinians were killed.
Articles
U.S. Gay Rights Activists: Stop Pinkwashing Palestinian Suffering!
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Richard Silverstein looks at how Israel’s gay rights hasbara seeks to blind Americans to Israeli mistreatment of Palestinians.
Articles
Bipartisan Congressional Efforts to Prevent Israeli-Palestinian Peace
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Last month, the Democratic Party aligned with the Republican Party to pass a dangerous piece of legislation that actually undermines the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. This legislation calls to dramatically expand U.S. military aid to Israel while keeping Israel dependent upon the United States. United States military aid to Israel already exceeds the monetary value of all foreign aid programs to sub-Saharan Africa combined, but Congress has voted to revamp it nonetheless.
Articles
Military Madness and PFC Manning
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Webs of blinding irony are being spun around Private First Class Manning, obscuring the military’s methodical denial of Manning’s constitutionally guaranteed right to a fair trial.
Analysis of Israel/Palestine
Transfer in Israel: Who and to Where?
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While the Israeli-Palestinian conflict seems in abeyance and “nothing happens,” it is really going on with full force in the only battlefield that matters: the settlement enterprise.
Articles
Healing Our World
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For years, we danced with the idea of a bar mitzvah. Thirteen is a milestone for all Jewish children, and I was determined that our son would take part. I knew he could learn a few simple prayers and songs; he has amazing memory skills, not uncommon for children with autism. Still, we worried. What if a large crowd unnerved him?