If we Muslims believe that “true” Islam, which is genuinely aligned with the will of the Creator, must be fundamentally peaceful, comprehensively merciful and objectively just, then it is our duty to cleanse the traditional, literalist, classical Islam and purify it to make an Islam that is worthy to be called a beautiful religion. http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4894/beautifying-islam   Read more

The answer to our culture’s dramatic increase in out-of-wedlock births and children raised by single parents is not to lower the bar further. Rather than promoting “planned parenting,” we should work to build a culture of marriage. http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2014/11/14076/?utm_source=The+Witherspoon+Institute&utm_campaign=24c27b75c0-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_15ce6af37b-24c27b75c0-84107317did Read more

She’s a great novelist with a lyrical style and refreshing openness to the divine reality.  She also has a wonderful take below on  Edwards’s metaphysics (philosophy of how reality works).  But her comment that Edwards’s view of hell betrays his vision of love is all wet.  In a future post I will explain. In the meantime, here is her illuminating short essay on America’s theologian. http://www.neh.gov/humanities/2014/novemberdecember/feature/jonathan-edwards-in-new-light-remembered-preaching-fire-and Read more

Friends: I think we should accommodate Christian, Jewish, and Muslim holidays.  But here is an fascinating voice, from a Jewish law professor at Northwestern: http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2014/11/13/the-menorah-principle-and-the-unravelling-of-public-religiosity/   Read more

Debates about Israel and Palestine often assume a historical narrative that is at odds with historical realities. http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2014/11/14044/ Read more

Roger Scruton If it is really poverty that we object to, then we should tolerate whatever is needed to lift people out of it, inequality included. http://eppc.org/publications/inequality-matters-scruton-piketty-france-socialism-wealth-poverty/ Read more

Studying the Bible in light of the Great Tradition http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2014/november/you-cant-read-scripture-alone.html Read more

It’s not just Jews—nearly all American faiths are in decline. Could this mean a boom is right around the corner? http://mosaicmagazine.com/response/2014/11/americas-religious-recession/ Read more

Evangelicals are learning to model both grace and truth when discussing homosexuality and same-sex marriage. http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2014/11/14081/ Read more

On campuses across the country, hostility toward unpopular ideas has become so irrational that many students, and some faculty members, now openly oppose freedom of speech. http://online.wsj.com/articles/harvey-silverglate-liberals-are-killing-the-liberal-arts-1415573959 Read more