Ever since the kerfuffle at the March for Life last week between a group of Catholic school boys in MAGA hats and a Native American veteran, I've been thinking a lot about symbols -- how they get their meaning, and how the same object or slogan can mean different things to different people. I know… Continue reading MAGA hats and the importance of symbols
It's one thing to protest for a cause -- and another to do it in the nation's capital. I'd done the former a few times, but when my mom told me she would pay for my plane ticket to Cleveland so we could drive down to DC together, it was an offer I couldn't refuse.… Continue reading Why I marched
Would your family have hidden mine from the Nazis? I kid you not, I asked this question of my friends when I was a child. It was the ultimate gauge to see if they were truly good people (thankfully, they all said yes, they would have hidden me, but many of them didn't even know… Continue reading When to end a friendship over politics
Is Jesus Christ the only way to heaven? I struggle a lot with this question- I know many Christians do. It's a particularly nasty struggle for me, because if the answer is yes, that means everyone in my family is going, or has gone, to the dark place. I wrestle with God quite a bit… Continue reading What Jesus might have meant by “the way to life is narrow”
You would think that, in order to convert from one religion to another, one would have to be pretty damn certain about their new beliefs. And I was – I still am, for the most part. It’s the details that sometimes trip me up – are people born sinners? Will God eternally punish people who… Continue reading Original sin vs. Original blessing
I was talking to my brother on the phone the other day: “You know, lately I’ve been thinking about the anxiety Mom had when we were growing up, about Nazis coming to America. And we all thought she was crazy.” “She wasn’t crazy,” he said. “That’s just a story we like to tell.” “Okay,” I… Continue reading This is how it starts
"Bitter" is a negative buzzword in Christian culture: it's holding on to anger and resentment, refusing to let it go. It's the opposite of forgiveness. In some circumstances, what some Christians call "bitterness" is actually trauma, depression, or anxiety. But good Christians aren't supposed to be "bitter"; they're supposed to reflect the joy they have… Continue reading Why so bitter?
If you've been paying attention to the news lately, you may be aware of the controversy regarding Donald Trump declaring Jerusalem the official capital of Israel. This is a controversial move for spiritual reasons as well as political ones. It's interesting that the same issues that plagued interfaith relations 2000+ years ago are just as… Continue reading Interfaith dialogue is necessary for peace
In November 2016, my faith took a hard nose dive. It was going that direction already, after a difficult season at a conservative seminary and acknowledging hard questions I couldn’t find sensible answers to. But if there’s one thing that really threatened to destroy it all, it was seeing a group of people, supposedly united… Continue reading Surviving the latest schism
