Refusing to acknowledge the shameful parts of United States history prevents real progress and flourishing.
History
Posted inPolitics & Society, Short Take
100 years after the Scopes Monkey Trial: religion, science and the era of eugenic racism
The Scopes trial has long been depicted as a clash between modern science and religious fundamentalism. But it was also a chapter in the eugenic racism that had become a creed of social elites in the early 20th century.
Posted inFaith, The Good Word
Religion scholar Elaine Pagels asks the right questions—and gives the wrong answers
A Homily for the Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, by Father Terrance Klein
Posted inFaith and Reason
A Catholic challenge to American exceptionalism
Is it possible to embrace the idea of a special, evenly divinely ordained mission for America without violating Christian ethical principles?
Posted inArts & Culture, Books
Review: Aimee Semple McPherson, America’s first media evangelist
In “Sister, Sinner: The Miraculous Life and Mysterious Disappearance of Aimee Semple McPherson,’ Claire Hoffman delivers with a fast-paced page turner on the life of Aimee Semple McPherson. This biography brings into print another review of the achievements and personal failures of this major pioneer of media evangelism.
Posted inArts & Culture, Books
Decline and fall? Christian Smith on the demise of traditional faith
In ‘Why Religion Went Obsolete: The Demise of Traditional Faith in America,’ Christian Smith argues that traditional institutional religion has lost its grasp on America—at least among Americans under the age of 50.
Posted inArts & Culture, Catholic Book Club
A relic of America magazine’s Jesuit patron, Edmund Campion
The patron saint of ‘America’ is Edmund Campion, S.J.—for several different reasons.
Posted inPolitics & Society, Short Take
A survivor of Nazi-occupied France asks: Who will protect Trump’s migrant targets?
My Jewish family was sheltered in a Christian village in Nazi-occupied France. Now I am a naturalized American citizen, but can I count on similar courage and good will from my neighbors?
Posted inPolitics & Society, Short Take
The L.A. immigration raids: This is what it feels like to be occupied by a foreign army.
No one I knew in Los Angeles was afraid to go downtown. That is, they were unafraid until President Donald Trump called in the National Guard and then the Marines.
Posted inFaith, Faith and Reason
Archbishop Weisenburger: Immigrants are—and always have been—the lifeblood of America.
Who are we as a country if we are unable to recognize the same aspirations demonstrated by today’s immigrants that once defined the immigrants of generations gone by?