Good article from Roberto Rivera on the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings (via Thunderstruck). While relatively few Americans can bring themselves to say that the deliberate targeting of non-combatants during World War II, regardless of the physics involved, was immoral, our commitment to jus in bello has grown to make the avoidance of “collateral damage” official…

The Churchwide Assembly just voted overwhelmingly to approve a recommendation to enter into “interim eucharistic sharing” with the UMC, which is short of the “full communion” we enjoy with other churches (go here for more info). The difference is explained thusly elsewhere: With an interim commitment, congregations and judicatories of both churches will be encouraged…

One of Gerhard Forde’s distinctive contributions was his thinking on the work of Christ. His essay by that name appears in Braaten and Jenson’s Christian Dogmatics. He also discusses it in several essays in the collection A More Radical Gospel. His essay “Caught in the Act: Reflections on the Work of Christ” can be found…

Prolific Lutheran theologian Gerhard O. Forde has died. Forde’s signature theme was to call for a return to the “radical gospel” of the Reformation, especially as found in Luther – that is, the Gospel proclaimed as an unconditional promise of pardon for sinners. Prof. Forde taught for many years at Luther Seminary in St. Paul.…

Christianity Today has launched a new weblog written by bioethicist Nigel M. de S. Cameron that will focus on “issues of life: creating it, ending it, enhancing it, and treating it properly.”

To say that religion and science can’t come into conflict should not, in my view, be taken to mean that there are “two truths” or that science deals with the world of “facts” while religion deals with “values” or “meaning.” Both purport to give us information about the world; that is, both make truth claims.…

Salon has an interview with philosopher Michael Ruse, an agnostic with a keen interest in the evolutionism-creationism debate. While thinking the creationism (and Intelligent Design) is bunk, Ruse nevertheless thinks that “evolutionism” (the materialistic worldview, as distinct from evolution or scientific theories about evolution) has become a kind of psuedo-religion in its own right. Ruse…

Interesting analysis from Michael Lind: Can the Democratic Party regain the kind of majority enjoyed by the New Deal Democrats between the 1930s and the 1960s? Not an occasional bare majority, but the kind of solid, enduring majority that permits the passage of major legislation? The answer is yes–but only if the Democratic Party ceases…

Interesting piece from the Miami Herald (via Hit & Run): Today marks the 60th anniversary of the atomic destruction of the Japanese city of Hiroshima during World War II. Americans reflect on this event in sharply differing ways. Some Americans recall the event with shame and express their hope that nuclear weapons never be used…

Doug Bandow writes: I don’t think it is Clinton bashing to point out that President Clinton side-stepped the UN because he knew he could not win Security Council approval. I opposed both the Kosovo and Iraq wars, but in my view at least the latter arguably involved fundamental U.S. security interests, and could be solved…