Christianity, Culture, Vocation
It’s illegal to buy a car direct from the factory or over the internet. You have to go through a local dealer. The electric car company Tesla is trying to change that. But state and local governments are resisting. That, arguably, goes against the free market and against the trends of the new technology. But do we really want online commerce to kill off small businesses that are the backbone of many small town economies? [Read more...]
The German government threatened to take away the children of a couple on the grounds that they were being homeschooled. So the family fled to the United States and applied for asylum, claiming that they faced persecution for their beliefs. Their application was first accepted, but later overturned, leading to a series of court battles, with the Obama administration arguing for deportation. Yesterday, an appeals court ruled against the family.
I thought the Obama administration wants amnesty for immigrants. Why not these immigrants, who–like many of the first settlers–came here specifically in search of religious, political, and personal liberty?
Maybe we need to start worrying about those black helicopters after all. The Obama administration keeps confirming the alarms over intrusive government and the violation of civil liberties. In an effort to track down the source of leaks, the justice department has secretly subpoened and seized two months of phone records of the Associated Press. David Schultz, lawyer for the AP, calls this crackdown on confidential sources a “dagger at the heart” of reporters’ ability to get the news.
Whether or not you are sympathetic to the plight of journalists here (and we must not let our dislike of the media distract from the First Amendment issues), this possible government overreach may have an unintended consequence: What if it turns the press against the Obama administration? Who knows what else they may dig up? [Read more...]
Kermit Gosnell, the abortionist found guilty of murder, will not be executed. He agreed not to appeal his conviction in exchange for a life sentence. [Read more...]
After 10 days of deliberation, the jury found abortionist Kermit Gosnell guilty of capital murder for killing babies a few moments after they were born, as opposed to his usual practice of killing them a few moments before they were born, which is legal. [Read more...]
English theologian John Milbank gives a different argument against gay marriage. He says it will give the state direct control over reproduction, removing the mediating effect of the family in favor of purely legalistic, arbitrary, and commodified state regulations. [Read more...]
Responding to the uproar about the prospect for court martials for evangelism that we blogged about, the military is clarifying that evangelism will, in fact, be allowed. Just not proselytizing.
So what’s the difference? The military’s definition is after the jump. Is this a valid distinction? What will determine one from the other? How might this apply outside the military, to the ways Christians share their faith in the public square? Is there some “witnessing” that should be out of bounds? [Read more...]
How persecution begins:
The Pentagon has released a statement confirming that soldiers could be prosecuted for promoting their faith: “Religious proselytization is not permitted within the Department of Defense…Court martials and non-judicial punishments are decided on a case-by-case basis…”. [Read more...]
Somebody hacked into the Twitter account of the Associated Press, no less, and put out word that there were explosions in the White House that injured the president. That sent the stock market into a tailspin, but it recovered when the story turned out to be a hoax.
Charges have been dropped for the Elvis impersonator who was accused of sending ricin-laced letters to the president, a senator, and a judge. Investigators have another suspect, a rival of the first one.
The surviving Boston Marathon bomber was charged for the federal crime of using weapons of mass destruction. He will not be treated as an enemy combatant. He was read his rights. The charge indicated that he may face the death penalty. (Massachusetts does not have the death penalty–though state legislators unsuccessfully tried to re-instate it for the bomber–but the federal government can still execute people.)
I suspect that the Boston Marathon bombings may complicate the two big issues facing Congress right now. On gun control, I daresay that when the citizens of Boston and its environs were told to stay inside and not to open their doors to anyone other than a uniformed police officer because a terrorist is roaming around somewhere, those who owned firearms were glad they did and many of those who did not wished they did. On immigration, the bombings reminded us that the issue is not just about letting Mexican workers in and letting them stay. It also needs to be about immigrants such as the bombers and keeping them out. Do you agree that this may shift public opinion on those two issues? What other repercussions do you see?
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