This & That

Last updated on: June 1, 2009 at 7:55 am by Pia de Solenni

This & That 2009-06-01T07:55:08-07:00 Pia de Solenni

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‘I’ve come across a few articles relating to the death of Dr. Tiller, the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor, and Notre Dame.

In case you’re wondering, the religious right did NOT kill Dr. Tiller. The WSJ has a good piece here by James Kirchick, assistant editor of the New Republic and a writer for The Advocate. On many issues, Kirchick disagrees with the religious right, but he points out the fallacy of the general trend of the media and pro-abortion advocates to demonize the religious right. Here’s clip:

I happen to support a legal regime that would, in Bill Clinton’s famous words, keep abortion safe, legal and rare. I hold no brief for the religious right, and its views on homosexuality in particular offend (and affect) me personally. But it’s precisely because of my identity that I consider comparisons between so-called Christianists (who seek to limit my rights via the ballot box) and Islamic fundamentalists (who seek to limit my rights via decapitation) to be fatuous.

In the coming days, we will hear more about how mainstream conservative organizations and media personalities created an “environment” in which the murder of an abortion doctor became an inevitability. Just as talk radio was blamed for the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, an attempt will be made to extend the guilt for this crime from the individual who pulled the trigger to the conservative movement writ large. But the Christian right’s responsible reaction to the death of George Tiller should put to rest the lie that Judeo-Christian extremists are anywhere near as numerous or dangerous as those of the Muslim variety.

Meanwhile, the back and forth about Sonia Sotomayor continues. I find some of her comments troubling, but I find it more disconcerting that the conversation is centering on her racial/ethnic identity than on her qualifications and actual demonstrated/written work. There are two good articles here and here , by Jeffrey Lord and Rachel Campos Duffy respectively. Definitely worth a quick look. Rachel addresses one of the twists in racism – namely what happens when your external ethnic features don’t correspond with the MSM’s view of what you should be saying. She concludes her piece saying:

I refuse to be silenced by those who demand that my race should determine my views or political affiliation. I may be brown on the outside, but on the inside, I’m all American.

For post game analysis on Notre Dame, Joseph Lawler has this piece. He concludes:

THE SURPRISING UPROARS OVER Obama’s scheduled appearance at the Joyce Center highlights the fact that people still look to Notre Dame as an exemplar of religion in public discourse. The reason for the uproar was not Notre Dame’s academic excellence: Not even Iranian tyrant Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s 2007 speech at the more prestigious Columbia University elicited such national interest. People are interested in Obama at Notre Dame because it is a scandal that the nation’s best example of Christian witness at the highest levels of education would disregard its own religious leaders’ directives and side instead with the secular mainstream.

Fr. Edward Sorin intuitively understood what would make his school successful. Shortly after founding Notre Dame, he wrote his superior, “Sometimes when I think of the good that can be done throughout the country, had we a College conducted according to Catholic principles, my desire to erect such a building torments me and disturbs my rest.”
Although the past 150 years have vindicated Sorin’s belief, Jenkins is apparently wiling to sell out the distinctive feature of his school to satisfy the requirements of liberal faculty members and the college guide rankings. At exactly the moment when, on campus and around the country, a generation of young people that cares about religious authenticity is looking for leadership, the administration is instead choosing to side with the establishment and the tired spirit of the ’60s.

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