There is something amazing about Maimonides: few have read him, fewer have understood him, and yet everyone wants him in his or her camp, from the Rebbe of Lubavitch to the Rebbe of (Yeshayahu) Lei- bowitz. Why is that? http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showpdf.php?id=34331   Read more

Bryan Caplan’s “Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids” is the antidote to Amy Chua’s best seller, “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother.” Whereas Ms. Chua insists that parents should have few children and then drive them relentlessly toward perfection, Mr. Caplan argues that people should have more children; that they are cheaper than we think; that parenting is less important than we imagine; and that kids can basically raise themselves. http://online.wsj.com/articl/SB10001424052748703806304576242661295724864.html     Read more

Fifty-one years ago, John Courtney Murray, whose scholarly work on the history and political theory of religious liberty shaped the Second Vatican Council’s 1965 Declaration on Religious Freedom, published We Hold These Truths: Catholic Reflections on the American Proposition–one of the best books ever written on what makes America America. In addition to limning the foundational truths that constituted the “proposition” on which the United States stood or fell, Murray (who borrowed the notion of an “American proposition” from Lincoln’s... Read more

RG: And somehow the chosenness of the Jewish people as it’s presented, at least in the prayer book, seems to have something to do with that day’s coming, that the Jewish example — being “a light unto the Gentiles,” as Isaiah says — is crucial to the rest of the world. MH: I think that’s right. And perhaps it’s a bit imperialistic that, in the end, everybody will sort of get it and join up. But it’s a very strong... Read more

by Joseph Bottum November 29, 2011 If one doubts America’s high authority to undertake war for the sake of ideals, one must also question its high authority to administer the death penalty. http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2011/11/4272   Read more

There will be no peace in our world without an understanding of the place of religion within it. The past decade has seen many convenient myths which disguised the importance of religion, stripped away. Many thought: as society progressed, religion would decline. It hasn’t happened. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/guest-voices/post/why-the-world-needs-faith/2011/11/17/gIQAf0d5UN_blog.html   Read more

There was another attack on Coptic Christians today as they marched through the Cairo neighborhood of Shoubra. Until the late 1960s, it was predominantly a Coptic district (today, some estimate, it is 40 percent Copt), which is why the rally’s organizers felt reasonably safe to march. Instead, Muslim activists attacked the demonstrators, some even threw Molotov cocktails. This news report claims seven were injured, while early accounts from the Ministry of Health indicate as that 29 Copts have been wounded,... Read more

Even the ability of the anti-Israeli majority at the United Nations to go on tormenting Israel has been compromised by perhaps the most hopeful development on the Middle East stage in some years. The new country of South Sudan, set up in January of this year as a response to the genocidal outrages of the Sudanese Arabs against their Christian, Muslim and animist non-Arab countrymen, has taken its place squarely with the Jew-ish state and attacked the Arab-led conspiracy against... Read more

Although ordained as a priest in the Church of England, Stott was one of the leading figures in the evangelical revival of the postwar era, both inside the Anglican world and in the larger evangelical community. He played a key role in campus organizations such as InterVarsity Christian Fellowship and took a keen interest in the international ministry of the church, particularly in the nations of the global south. He was the chief author of the Lausanne Covenant, an important... Read more

The Founders’ protection of religious freedom in the First Amendment was in keeping with their recognition of the supreme importance of the individual, who was created by God and subject to God’s natural law. The early twentieth-century Progressives largely rejected this view, as they concluded that man must not be limited by “arbitrary” rules such as those imposed by religion. Modern progressives have seized upon this viewpoint, especially in their attitudes toward sex. The State will teach children about sex,... Read more