Here’s a really interesting post by Caleb McDaniel on the rehabilitation of John Brown‘s reputation, slavery, and violence vs. non-violence. McDaniel notes that a new book seeking to refurbish Brown’s stature has met with several laudatory reviews from folks like Barbara Ehrenreich and Christopher Hitchens that favorably compare Brown’s “more radical” willingness to deploy violence…

A propos of Memorial Day, Pen at The Gutless Pacifist links to this interview from last year with pacifist theologian Stanley Hauerwas. The ever contrarian Hauerwas, as we might expect, rejects the received view of World War II: This Memorial Day, the new monument to World War II veterans formally opens on the Mall in…

A downright positive (although somewhat spoilerish!) review of Revenge of the Sith from Variety (via Big Hominid). I never had any doubt I would see it – my love of Star Wars was imprinted on me at a very young age, making it virtually impossible for me to be objective about the series (for what…

There’s an ongoing debate between proponents of free trade and those who favor “fair trade” (or, alternatively, “trade justice” – not sure of the extent to which the latter two terms mean the same thing). Fr. Jake had a post on the topic the other day, linking to this sermon by Rowan Williams as well…

An interesting discussion going on about sexual ethics. Hugo started things off with a bunch of posts about how he approaches sexual ethics with his youth group (several on Hugo’s front page – scroll down). Good follow up posts from Lynn at Noli Irritare Leones (here and here) and Camassia. Also, a good post on…

Hey, it’s the Feast of the Ascension! I like this: Consider this. Suppose Jesus was resurrected and returned to earth. But like any person who has come back from a near death experience, after a brief period of euphoria, things would have returned to normal. The days would have passed like those of any other…

Isn’t it kind of funny that people tend to use the expressions “desert island” and “deserted island” interchangeably? Usually when talking about things like “What five books” etc. would you want to take to a desert/deserted island. Surely what we usually mean is deserted island, right? As in being stranded alone somewhere. Though I guess…

Today I received an e-mail from Sojourners calling for military intervention in the Darfur region of Sudan to protect civilians from government-sponsored militias. This seems to have become a kind of cause célèbre among certain elements of the Christian left (for lack of a better term). And it’s certainly a worthy one. Still, as I’ve…

You Are 60% Normal (Really Normal) Otherwise known as the normal amount of normal You’re like most people most of the time But you’ve got those quirks that make you endearing You’re unique, yes… but not frighteningly so! Take the quiz: How Normal Are You?

There’s a post at Here We Stand that is relevant to some of the things we’ve been discussing around here: “The Paradox of Submission to the Governing Authorities.”