A Piece of Personal Testimony on All Saints' Day: The Sanctity of Many Queer People and Their Loving Relationships

This All Saints' day, I think of a little iconostasis I kept for some years next to my desk. The saints whose pictures or icons I had on the iconostasis were my own personal saints — an idiosyncratic collection, almost all of whom would never be canonized by the church.

When the Instinctual Response of Christian Communities to a Changing World Is, No!

Read the responses of a number of bishops and the homophobic sector of Catholic Twitter to the recently released papal statement about civil unions for same-sex couples, and the word you will hear over and over is, No.

"Nobody Should Be Thrown Out": Francis's Latest Shock Wave (in Some Circles) re: Same-Sex Civil Unions

James Alison, "Pope Francis backing same sex unions isn't a surprise. But it's still a big deal"

As Jamie Manson tweets today, the usual Vatican shuffle is now taking place regarding what Pope Francis is said to have said (or is now said not to have said) regarding same-sex unions. You know that shuffle: it's a two step; one step forward, then walk the forward step back two steps, until no one knows who has said what (or not said what) or what was meant. As Jamie Manson also says in the tweet I have just linked, LGBTQ people deserve much, much better than this.

Adriano Oliva's Amours: L'Église, les divorcés remariés, les couples homosexuels — Response from a Reader re: Aquinas' Theology of Marriage

One of my Facebook friends, Jean-François Garneau in Montréal, has responded to my recent posting about how Adriano Oliva's book Amours: L'Église, les divorcés remariés, les couples homosexuels — deals with the topic of procreation in Thomas Aquinas' theology of marriage. As my posting noted,

Notes on Adriano Oliva's Amours: L'Église, les divorcés remariés, les couples homosexuels — On Sexual Relations Between Women as Less Sinful Than Sodomy

As a footnote to what I posted yesterday regarding Adriano Oliva's book Amours: L'Église, les divorcés remariés, les couples homosexuels (Paris: Cerf, 2015) and its discussion of Aquinas' views regarding the sacrament of marriage, I'd like to offer  you the passage above as a reminder of some aspects of Aquinas' worldview that affect his understanding of sexuality, gender, and marriage. I offer this passage from pp. 78-9 of Adriano's book both as a footnote to the discussion of his theology of marriage, and as a prelude to his discussion of homosexuality, on which I'll focus in my next posting (or two) about his book.

Notes on Adriano Oliva's Amours: L'Église, les divorcés remariés, les couples homosexuels — Procreation in Aquinas' Theology of Marriage

Back in January 2016, I shared with you some notes about Adriano Oliva's book Amours: L'Église, les divorcés remariés, les couples homosexuels (Paris: Cerf, 2015). As I shared my comments about Oliva's book, which was written as theological reflection on issues central to the synod on the family in 2015, I told you that my comments were more a set of notes than a review of the book per se.

Austin Serial Bomber Mark Anthony Conditt, a Quiet Home-Schooled White Evangelical Boy from a "Loving" and "Good Family"

Here's a photo of the family of Austin, Texas, serial bomber Mark Anthony Conditt, from Instagram by way of this Daily Mail article.* "Just a 'neighborhood kid' from a good family," a neighbor states. Neighbors also indicate (the last link to a Houston Chronicle article by Keri Blakinger, Samantha Ketterer, and Alejandra Matos is again my source for this information) that the family hosted "large religious gatherings" at its home on Sundays, in the house in which it home-schooled all its children:

Charles Pierce on How "It's Not about Race Because Nothing Ever Is about Race."

Charles Pierce today at his "Politics" blog at Esquire, commenting on the "gerrymandered mess" the Republican-controlled North Carolina legislature has made of the state's election maps, and about the arguments the lawyer representing the Republicans in the legislature is advancing to defend said mess:

Update on Judge Wendell Gfiffen of Little Rock: Judge Griffen Files Suit vs. Arkansas Supreme Court for Violating His Religious Liberty

In May, I told you of a move to impeach Arkansas judge (and my friend) Wendell Griffen after he took part in a public demonstration against the death penalty organized on Good Friday by the church he pastors in Little Rock, New Millennium Baptist church. In response to his involvement in this protest, the Arkansas Supreme Court and Arkansas Attorney General restricted the kinds of cases at which Judge Griffen might preside, claiming that he was too biased to hear some cases, such as ones in which the death penalty might be an appropriate sentence in their view.

Faith Defined as Dogma Is Weaponized Faith: A Theological Footnote to Father Jenkins' Response to Senator Feinstein re: Catholic Dogma

I'd like to add a theological footnote to what I posted yesterday reflecting on the recent claim of Notre Dame University president Father John Jenkins that "'dogma lives loudly' . . . is a condition we call faith." As I noted, Father Jenkins makes this assertion in an open letter to Senator Diane Feinstein criticizing her statement to Notre Dame law professor Amy Coney Barrett, who is being vetted for a federal judge's position, that "dogma lives loudly" in Barrett and might impede her ability to uphold the law when the law conflicts with her dogmatic religious positions.

Notre Dame President Father Jenkins Responds to Senator Feinstein: "'Dogma Lives Loudly' . . . Is a Condition We Call Faith" (But No, It's Not)

At a hearing last week, Senator Diane Feinstein grilled federal judge nominee (and Notre Dame University law professor) Amy Coney Barrett about a paper she co-authored in 1998 with John Garvey, who is now president of Catholic University of America. Senator Feinstein suggested that the position Barrett took in her 1998 paper is tantamount to proposing that, for someone sitting on a court bench, religious faith should trump law when the two appear to be in conflict. 

How Right Robert P. Jones Turns Out to Be: "Obama Presidency Provided a Unique Focal Point for Many White Christian Voters"

Back in late July, when I began a report for you (in a series of postings) about Robert P. Jones' book The End of White Christian America, I wrote, 

Question "What Is Church For?" Emerges Again with Polling Data About Who Supports Trump and Who Thinks Anti-Gay Discrimination Should Be Allowed If Business Owners Cite Religion

Johann Baptist Metz,  "Communicating a Dangerous Memory"

For your consideration:

Patricia Miller on Why White Catholics of the John Paul II Church May Be Rejecting Donald Trump: "Seems Awfully Quiet in the Catholic Trenches This Year"

In a just-published essay at Religion Dispatches, Patricia Miller takes a sharp look at the discernible trend of white Catholics towards Hillary Clinton and away from Donald Trump. I discussed this trend several weeks ago, calling it slight. Patti Miller offers persuasive evidence for it as more than a slight trend, and notes, in particular, the movement of white church-going Catholics of the John Paul II church in the direction of the Democratic candidate and away from the Republican one — a noteworthy trend, when that demographic has been trending "with alacrity" to the GOP since 2000, as she states.

What Earthly Good Do Churches Do? On Christian Support for Donald Trump, and Whether It's Possible to Remain Christian

Michael Boyle describes, and brilliantly so, the turning that happened inside him after he entered the Dominicans and began preparing for ordination — and then realized that what the Catholic party line was telling him about celibacy, clerical life, and health was not quite cogent:

Claims of Persecution and Catholic Support for Trump: Need to Move Beyond Defensive Parochial Response to Engage Real Issues — Like White Catholic Racism

In a recent essay for Fortune, Matthew Schmalz, who teaches religious studies at the College of the Holy Cross, suggests that Donald Trump resonates with some Catholic voters because "[t]here’s a sense among many non-college-educated, white, Catholic voters that they are doubly marginalized—by their economic status and by their religious identity." As Schmalz explains, though (white) Catholics have been assimilated in American society, many Catholics still carry "generational memories" of having been excluded from affluent mainstream Protestant-dominated culture in the U.S.

Commentary on U.S. Catholic Bishops and "Religious Liberty" Crusade As "Fortnight for Freedom" Begins: "Fair to Say Religious Liberty Has a Damaged 'Brand' These Days"

This week, the U.S. Catholic bishops began their latest "Fortnight for Freedom" shindig, whose purpose is to drive Catholic voters to the polls to vote Republican (as they claim) to defend a "religious liberty" now under siege because gay people have the legal right to marry civilly, because the Obama administration is mandating contraceptive coverage in its Affordable Care Act, because denying rights, goods, and services to targeted others while claiming that one has a religious warrant to discriminate is increasingly distasteful to more and more Americans, etc. 

More Commentary on Tony Spence's Firing and Consequences for U.S. Catholics, Commentary on Norwegian Lutherans' Embrace of Same-Sex Marriage

More commentary on two stories that have been discussed here recently — the firing of Catholic News Service director Tony Spence after he tweeted criticism of the anti-LGBT laws recently passed in North Carolina and Mississippi; and the decision of the state church of Norway, its Lutheran church, to recognize same-sex marriage and to celebrate same-sex marriages in churches (the latter story has been discussed by Chris Morley in comments here lately).

Anthony Annett and Patrica Miller Respond to Catholic Neocons Calling on Catholics to Stop Trump: "These Issues Are All—to Coin a Phrase—Non-Negotiable"

At Commonweal, Anthony Annett responds to the appeal of Catholic neocons Robert George and George Weigel to Catholics to stop Donald Trump in his tracks, which I discussed earlier today (and here):

Racism Is Not a Non-Negotiable: White Catholic Voters and Trump, Responsibility of the U.S. Bishops and Catholic Neocon and Centrist Lay Leaders

And so who's voting for Donald Trump in the primaries now being held around the country? The "surprising" (but entirely predictable, for those of us with close ties to white evangelical culture) finding that white evangelicals are gung-ho about Trump keeps being noted and is no longer surprising to anyone, though it apparently presents quite a conundrum for political and religious commentators who have blinded themselves to solid evidence for several decades now that the defection of white evangelicals in the South from Nixon forward has been all about race.