Religion
January 16, 2020 — John Hinderaker
Today President Trump signed a “guidance” issued by the Department of Education on “Constitutionally Protected Prayer and Religious Expression in Public Elementary and Secondary Schools.” It updates the last such guidance, which was issued in 2003. The president promoted the event, coinciding with National Religious Freedom Day, as a step toward freedom of religion. President @realDonaldTrump announced historic steps to protect the Constitutional right to pray in public schools! pic.twitter.com/YsORcxUpWa
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December 27, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Even more surprising than fake religion from Pete Buttigieg is fake religion from the formidable Timothy Cardinal Dolan. In his Christmas Eve New York Post column “A Christmas lesson on housing the poor,” Cardinal Dolan writes: “The Son of God was homeless; his earthly parents were immigrants and refugees.” I’m not Christian and mean no disrespect. For the reasons set forth in Paul’s post, however, I doubt Cardinal Dolan has
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December 26, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
Pete Buttigieg has tried to carve out a niche among Democratic presidential hopefuls as the candidate who is comfortable talking about religion. Unfortunately, he’s only comfortable trying to use religion as a means of beating conservatives, especially religious ones, over the head. This annoying penchant was on display again in Buttigieg’s Christmas message. He tweeted: Today I join millions around the world in celebrating the arrival of divinity on earth,
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September 18, 2019 — Steven Hayward
I gather this Friday there is going to be a climate jamboree at the United Nations, and I know what you’re thinking: bor-ing. Yes, indeed. It’s not even worth filling out a Climate Doomsday bingo card with hits on “only 12 years left,” “climate crisis/emergency,” “the ice is melting,” etc. I may or may not have more to say about it depending on whether there is some original stupidity to
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September 7, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
My conservative cousin formerly from New York (now from California) has closely followed presidential politics since the days of Dwight Eisenhower. He finds in Pete Buttigieg an arrogance he hasn’t come across before, not even from Barack Obama. Pete Buttigieg may well be the most arrogant candidate ever to run for a major party’s nomination in American History. Start with his record as South Bend, Indiana Mayor. Buttigieg admits to
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July 24, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
The Senate today confirmed Brian Buescher, President Trump’s nominee to the U.S. District Court in Nebraska. Readers may recall that Senate Democrats attacked Buescher for his membership in the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic service organization. I wrote about this here. Sen. Kamala Harris was one of the Senators who led the charge against Buescher during his Committee hearing. His other main adversary was Sen. Mazie Hirono, one of the
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June 6, 2019 — Scott Johnson
James Freeman’s June 4 WSJ Best of the Web column is “Democrats vs. Nuns.” In the column he alerts us to this news: “More than two years after Barack Obama left the White House, there’s still no cease-fire in a legal war on women of faith. The non-profit law firm Becket said [on Tuesday] that a group of nuns will once again have to defend their beliefs in a San
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May 10, 2019 — Steven Hayward
Another busy, travel-heavy week, so I wasn’t able to post a proper obituary notice for John Lukacs, who passed away early this week at the age of 95. The first Lukacs book I read as an undergraduate way back in 1980 was The Passing of the Modern Age, followed shortly by 1945: Year Zero, and I was hooked. (Both of these books hold up extremely well after 40 years.) Lukacs
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April 24, 2019 — John Hinderaker
Before Easter fades too far into the rear-view mirror, I want to note this stunningly ignorant op-ed in the New York Times: “As a Black Child in Los Angeles, I Couldn’t Understand Why Jesus Had Blue Eyes.” The author decries the Western tradition of depicting Jesus as a white man, and adds: Jesus, born in Bethlehem, was most likely a Palestinian man with dark skin. As the Daily Wire correctly
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April 19, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
Within hours of the fire that destroyed much of the Notre Dame Cathedral, donors pledged more than $1 billion to restore this magnificent, iconic structure and place of worship. So reports the Washington Post. In the same article, the Post also reports on a backlash against this amazing generosity. A leader of the Yellow Vest movement says that if donors can give so much money to rebuild Notre Dame, “they
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April 16, 2019 — Steven Hayward
Like Paul I’m overwhelmed by the sight of Notre Dame in flames. I don’t know how many times I have visited, but one of my favorite things to do in Paris is to linger outside the Shakespeare & Company bookstore right across the Seine and gaze at the cathedral especially in the changing afternoon and early evening light, much as Cezanne and Monet must have done to inspire some of
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April 15, 2019 — John Hinderaker
Like Paul, I was stunned by the news that Notre Dame Cathedral was on fire. Unlike Paul, whose wife is from Paris and who has spent a lot of time there, I have never been to Paris and have not seen Notre Dame. So I have no personal connection to the cathedral. Nevertheless, I was devastated at early reports that Notre Dame was likely to be a total loss. More
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March 5, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
The Colorado Civil Rights Commission has decided to dismiss its pending discrimination charge against Jack Phillips of Masterpiece Cakeshop. Phillips, you will recall, refused on grounds of his deeply held religious beliefs to bake a cake to celebrate a gay marriage. The Commission found him in violation of the law and imposed severe punishment. The case went all the way to the Supreme Court, where Phillips prevailed. Thereafter, Phillips refused
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February 7, 2019 — Scott Johnson
I deduced the Booker Doctrine from Senator Cory Booker’s disgusting interrogation of D.C. Circuit nominee Neomi Rao on Tuesday in her confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee (video below, transcript here). Under the Booker Doctrine, orthodox Christians and Jews are disqualified from public life because of their adherence to traditional views of sexual morality. If Booker were consistent, the Booker Doctrine doctrine would apply to Muslims as well as
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February 6, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Among notable doctrines in American history we must count the Monroe Doctrine, the Freeport Doctrine, the Truman Doctrine, the Carter Doctrine, and the Reagan Doctrine. Most of these are presidential foreign-policy doctrines, but not all of them. The Freeport Doctrine is attributable to Senator Stephen Douglas. To these I would add the Booker Doctrine. The Booker Doctrine is implicit in his disgusting interrogation of Trump judicial nominee Neomi Rao when
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February 5, 2019 — John Hinderaker
Nancy Pelosi claims to be a Catholic. Charitably interpreted, that means her grandparents were Catholics; possibly even one or both of her parents. But Pelosi has not even a nodding acquaintance with Christian doctrine. The latest example, via PJ Media, is revealing. Remarkably, Pelosi was addressing an audience of Christian college and university presidents and administrators. Is “chutzpah” a Catholic term of art? After a brief, self-deprecating introduction, Speaker Pelosi
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January 23, 2019 — John Hinderaker
Ilhan Omar’s outrageous lies about the Covington Catholic boys, since deleted, illustrate an important lesson. Omar is a notorious anti-Semite; she goes so far as to advocate for the BDS movement. So, is it surprising that her venom has now been directed against Catholics? Not at all. The people who hate Jews are, for the most part, the same people who hate Christians. In the last few months, we have
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