Readings (17 June 2014)

The Anti-Semitic Hungarian Politician’s Bris, from the Tablet. A leader of Hungary’s Jobbik party discovers that his maternal grandparents were Jewish and changes his whole life, including buy and burning thousands of copes of his just-published manifesto.

The Archbishop of San Francisco’s response to an attempted ideological mugging, in which he turns the mugger’s pet phrases back on them, only he means them. For example:

Please do not make judgments based on stereotypes, media images and comments taken out of context. Rather, get to know us first as fellow human beings. I myself am willing to meet personally with any of you not only to dialogue, but simply so that we can get to know each other. It is the personal encounter that changes the vision of the other and softens the heart. In the end, love is the answer, and this can happen even between people with such deep disagreements. That may sound fanciful and far-fetched, but it is true, it is possible. I know it is possible, I know this from personal experience. When we come together seeking to understand the other with good will, miracles can happen.

Alternative Literature from XKCD.

A new interview with Pope Francis, from CNA. He takes up a range of subjects, including economics and the poor, relations with the Orthodox, anti-semitism, and divisions within nations. “You told me a year ago that “within every Christian there is a Jew,” he said,

Perhaps it would be more correct to say “you cannot live your Christianity, you cannot be a real Christian, if you do not recognize your Jewish roots.” I don’t speak of Jewish in the sense of the Semitic race but rather in the religious sense. I think that inter-religious dialogue needs to deepen in this, in Christianity’s Jewish root and in the Christian flowering of Judaism. I understand it is a challenge, a hot potato, but it can be done as brothers. I pray every day the divine office every day with the Psalms of David. We do the 150 psalms in one week. My prayer is Jewish and I have the Eucharist, which is Christian.

Ars tests Internet surveillance—by spying on an NPR reporter, from Ars Technica. It begins:

On a bright April morning in Menlo Park, California, I became an Internet spy. This was easier than it sounds because I had a willing target. I had partnered with National Public Radio (NPR) tech correspondent Steve Henn for an experiment in Internet surveillance. For one week, while Henn researched a story, he allowed himself to be watched—acting as a stand-in, in effect, for everyone who uses Internet-connected devices. How much of our lives do we really reveal simply by going online?