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Inspired by women ordained

  • The Community of Mary Magdalene, First Apostle, based in St. Cloud, MN, supports and plans liturgies with Catholic womenpriests. Kelly Doss, one of our group, witnessed a Womenpriest Ordination for the first time on June 26 and wrote this.
  • Excerpts from the homily by Bishop Regina Nicolosi

Jeanette Blonigen Clancy, God Is Not Three Guys in the Sky

Thanks to Evergreene Digest reader Bob Wedl for submitting this article.

As the procession began, I remember my eyes welling up with tears. I thought, “I cannot believe I get to be part of this! This is really happening before my eyes—a woman being ordained.”

. . . Everyone’s love and spiritual presence filled the room! It was a diverse crowd, and yet I could sense the unity and how truly welcome we all felt in that church. I could even sense it in the music. The choir sounded heavenly and all sang with such harmonious force. I believe that for everyone there, this just seemed so natural and beautiful.

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Excerpts from the homily by Bishop Regina Nicolosi, Jeanette Blonigen Clancy, God Is Not Three Guys in the Sky
There should be sheer joy that we can celebrate the ordinations of Monique and Maria on the feast of Corpus Christi. However, the sound of their names alone makes it apparent that there is tension and pain interlaced with the joy in what we are about to do, a tension which would not exist were their names Michael and Marvin.

Muslim Americans must draw a line against violence

Guest columnist Khalilah Sabra comments on the role and contributions of Muslims in American society. They are not represented by the recent foiled attack on the Seattle military-recruiting center.

Khalilah Sabra, Seattle Times | WA

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Muslim civic energy is useless when progressive thought is buried beneath violent transgressions and isolation. We, as a community, must draw a line in the sand.

Our community leaders must be more aggressive in reminding its members what values Islam teaches us to embrace, with what degree of passion and what real Islamic character is. Most of all, we must ensure every member knows how to respond to the urges and tensions of a Muslim life that is currently dealing with society's response to Islam.

Violence is not the answer. Men have only the rights that they can protect. Our most priceless right is life. The prohibition against murder is rooted in every religion and in every human constitution.

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Interdependence Day Celebration

We in the Network of Spiritual Progressives (NSP) believe that avoiding July 4 or turning it into nothing more than a picnic with friends is a mistake for progressives. There is much worth celebrating in American history that deserves attention on July 4th, despite the current depravity of some of our current policies, though the celebration-worthy aspects of our society are rarely the focus of other public events.

Rabbi Michael Lerner, Network of Spiritual Progressives

This article is made possible with the generous contributions of readers like you. Thank you!

Faced with July 4th celebrations that are focused on militarism, ultra-nationalism, and “bombs bursting in air,” many American families who do not share those values turn July 4th into another summer holiday focused on picnics, sports, and fireworks, while doing their best to avoid the dominant rhetoric and bombast.

This year that kind of celebration is particularly difficult when many of us are in mourning because of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, US drones killing innocents in Pakistan, and the US gearing up to impose sanctions and possibly support an Israeli attack or even US attack on Iran. And we also mourn the continuing assault on the earth by greedy corporations acting according to the logic of global capitalism and protected by the fearsome might of American military power.

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Gimme that ol’ time religion

“When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.”

Paul Richard Harris, Axis of Logic

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That phrase is often attributed to Sinclair Lewis, although it doesn’t appear in any of his writing, or any recorded interview. It might be a paraphrase of similar words from Huey Long, governor of Louisiana (1928-1932), and a US senator thereafter until his assassination in 1935. But anyone who has read Lewis’s books Elmer Gantry and It can’t happen here can easily believe the quote came from him.

Regardless of who wrote or said it, he or she couldn’t have been more prescient.

Most people in the West have bemoaned the rise of religious extremism in Muslim countries, largely because they haven’t been paying attention. Extremism throughout the Muslim world has a long history – we just didn’t hear about it much because no one in those countries flexed their muscles in a way that bothered us. Once they did, we suddenly realized there might be a problem. Some Westerners have started, then, to breathe a sigh of relief with the pro-democracy movement sweeping across North Africa and the Middle East, and stemming almost entirely from secular forces.

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All Religious Affiliations Are Pro-Choice, Except for White Evangelicals

  • This survey, and the report, does much to disentangle the idea that religious voters do exactly what religious authorities (like the Catholic Church) tell them - and that people of faith are overwhelmingly pro-life.
  • More than 7 in 10 religious Americans believe it is possible to disagree with the teachings of their religion on the issue of abortion and still be considered a person of good standing in their faith.

Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux, Care2.com

This article is made possible with the generous contributions of readers like you. Thank you!

According to a new survey by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), the "millennial" generation does not have a "religious voter" with a firm stance on abortion, although these younger people of faith seem to be more pro-choice than otherwise.  According to the executive summary, "with the exception of white evangelical Protestants, majorities of all major religious groups say abortion should be legal in all or most cases."  This flies in the face of the widely held notion that religious people are pro-life.

But according to the survey, people also tend to identify with both "pro-choice" and "pro-life" labels, indicating that the binary may be rather useless.  This is visible in almost every demographic group.  PRRI's research director, Daniel Cox, points out in the news release that many Americans believe that abortion is morally wrong, but that it should also be legal.  This view is not compatible with the "pro-choice"/"pro-life" divide.

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