Controversy about Gay Student Website Erupts at Arkansas Church of Christ University

My previous posting had an Arkansas angle with its comments about Rev. Mike Huckabee and my knowledge of that gentleman's political career, since I grew up in and live in Arkansas.  In fact, Rev. Huckabee graduated from a Southern Baptist university in Arkansas, Ouachita University, of which my father's brother was the academic vice-president for some years, and in which my uncle's wife taught English.

Mau Maus and Madrassases: Huckabee's (Deliberate and Racist) Slip of the Tongue

 

I'm fascinated by a conversation that has developed at several blog sites in the past day or so, about what Mike Huckabee meant when he recently made what he is calling a verbal gaffe as he stated that President Obama grew up in Kenya.  In particular, I'm intrigued by Huckabee's reference to the Mau Mau uprising in Kenya and the possible involvement of Obama's father's family in that event.

A Moral Perspective re: the Catholic Abuse Crisis: Do No Harm

Nicholas Maes, "Jesus Blessing the Children"

I’ve mentioned a crisis in my family recently.  And as a result of that crisis, I am having to revisit aspects of my childhood that I thought I had put behind me, had buried along with the adults of my parents’ generation.  Of that generation, I have only an aunt living.  And an uncle by marriage.

Commentary on Gingrich's Presidential Aspirations Continues

Newt Gingrich and Wife Callista

Religion Dispatches has two good pieces today looking at (first essay) Newt Gingrich's attempt to re-create himself as the model Catholic presidential candidate, and (second essay) at the role religion and the religious right will be likely to play in the election.  Joanna Brooks surveys Gingrich's "new Catholic" rebranding.

Remembering St. David's Day

 

And for what it's worth, on the day of St. David: a small excerpt from something I posted over on my travel blog several years ago, about a pilgrimage Steve and I took in May 2006.  We began at the shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham in Norfolk and then made our way west across southern England, praying at various holy places along the way, until we ended up at the shrine of St. David in Pembrokeshire, Wales.

Richard Mellon Scaife on GOP Attack on Planned Parenthood: "Dead Wrong"

Another follow-up posting: this follows up on another appeal to educate ourselves that I posted several days ago.  I'm referring to my posting calling on readers to look at the moral implications of the current attack on Planned Parenthood from a broader perspective than that provided by the single issue of abortion on which too many pro-lifers are monomaniacally focused. 

Mark Silk on the Revival of the Crusades as 2012 Election Cycle Begins

As a follow-up to what I posted yesterday about Rick Santorum and his recent remarks about the crusades, I'd like to point to a very valuable posting on the same topic at Mark Silk's Spiritual Politics blog.  Mark kindly provided the link in a comment on my Santorum posting yesterday.