Smart people saying smart things (7.12)

Last updated on: July 12, 2014 at 4:28 pm by Fred Clark

Smart people saying smart things (7.12) 2014-07-12T16:28:51-04:00 Fred Clark

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

The Rev. Gay Clark Jennings on the Christians who would have turned Jesus and Mary away at the Egyptian border. Rachel Marie Stone on the death toll of anti-birth control sanctimony. William Lindsey on the cultural captivity of the anti-gay church. And Andrew Bacevich and E.B. White on the perils and the promise of American democracy.

(And I’m still hoping the WordPress excerpt feature gets fixed.)

The Rev. Gay Clark Jennings, “Christians worship a child who fled violence in his home country”

The baby Jesus survived Herod’s massacre because his parents took him across a border to a land where he was safe. Just like parents in Central America who are sending their children away, Mary and Joseph took great risks so their son could survive.

The Bible doesn’t tell us who helped them make it across the border to Egypt or who gave them refuge there, but, in Matthew’s telling, we Christians have those anonymous kindly Egyptians to thank for our faith.

People of faith are called upon not only to be charitable, but also to go beyond charity. We must oppose the false choice being offered by those who want to prevent refugee children from entering the country.

Rachel Marie Stone, “The Birth Control Debate We Shouldn’t Be Having”

So yes. I do understand what people feel is at stake. But I also believe that to reject and inhibit access to birth control on the remote and contested possibility that a fertilized egg might not implant is to consign more than a million and a half people annually — mostly children, but many women — to death.

William Lindsey, “Margaret Farley’s Challenge to Make Love of Gay Persons Just in Christian Churches, and the Vatican Synod on the Family”

Vatican teaching about human sexuality tacitly lifts to the level of core church doctrine cultural norms that view men and women as essentially different from each other in their very natures, because of their different biological make-up. Catholic magisterial teaching accepts and furthers cultural presuppositions that men are made for one thing and women for another — just as it accepts and furthers the hidden presuppositions inside those taken-for-granted cultural presuppositions that men are made to rule and women to obey.

The homophobia freely incorporated into official Catholic teaching about gender is homophobia that flows from these longstanding, unreflective cultural presuppositions about the place of men and women in the scheme of things. It’s homophobia that gives heterosexual males pride of place in God’s plan for the world. Far from being countercultural, Catholic magisterial teaching on these matters is stolidly rooted in the status quo, in culture itself. It is a prop for what people already believe (and want to believe) about men, women, and gay folks, and what they do not want to question, since the questions that flow from any critical analysis of the easy scheme of dominant male, submissive female dualism that runs through all the major institutions of our culture make many of us extremely uncomfortable.

Andrew Bacevich, on Moyers & Company

What can the richest and most powerful country in the world do to alleviate the suffering of innocent people who are caught up in this violence?

And my answer to that question is not air strikes. My answer to that question is, well, if indeed we have a moral responsibility to come to the aid of suffering Iraqis and Syrians, then we better start opening up our wallets to be far more generous and forthcoming in providing assistance that people need.

You know, we live in a country where if you want to go bomb somebody, there’s remarkably little discussion about how much it might cost, even though the costs almost inevitably end up being orders of magnitude larger than anybody projected at the outcome. But when you have a discussion about whether or not we can assist people who are suffering, then suddenly we come very, you know, cost-conscious.

E.B. White, “On the Meaning of Democracy” (1943)

We received a letter from the Writers’ War Board the other day asking for a statement on “The Meaning of Democracy.” It presumably is our duty to comply with such a request, and it is certainly our pleasure.

Surely the Board knows what democracy is. It is the line that forms on the right. It is the don’t in don’t shove. It is the hole in the stuffed shirt through which the sawdust slowly trickles; it is the dent in the high hat. Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time. It is the feeling of privacy in the voting booths, the feeling of communion in the libraries, the feeling of vitality everywhere. Democracy is a letter to the editor. Democracy is the score at the beginning of the ninth. It is an idea which hasn’t been disproved yet, a song the words of which have not gone bad. It’s the mustard on the hot dog and the cream in the rationed coffee. Democracy is a request from a War Board, in the middle of a morning in the middle of a war, wanting to know what democracy is.

they are coming for your birth control

Previous Post

July 11, 2014

We dream a beautiful dream, we lose a beautiful thing

Next Post

July 13, 2014 Sunday favorites

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category class warfare evangelicals Iraq Left Behind Mammon music Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

I worked with a trowel in one hand and a weapon in the other, ready to build and fight. Who am I?

Select your answer to see how you score.

The Tribe of Judah The Priests The builders The servants