Pope Francis speaking at the Presidential Palace in Baghdad, March 5th, 2021. Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 3.0). Any way you look at it, Pope Francis’ March trip to Iraq had the appearances of being rash and even reckless on the surface. This Mideast country has been ravaged by years of war and rocked more recently like…
Photo by Giammarco Boscaro on Unsplash. When Harvard law professor Adrian Vermeule published his article “Beyond Originalism” in The Atlantic last year, his critics saw it as a moment of revelation. The legal right, after decades of hiding behind the mask of proceduralism, had finally reared its true, authoritarian face. Criticism of the article, however,…
Photo by Angelina Kazakova on Unsplash. “Well, I personally think we should scrap the constitution,” current congressional candidate Michael Sisco proclaimed in December 2020 during an episode of his podcast The Michael Sisco Show. During that same episode, titled “The Republic is a Deception,” Sisco mentioned that he favors a form of Byzantine symphonia “where…
Photo by Sajjad Ahmad on Unsplash. Offering a cup of tea to a stranger is universally viewed as an act of hospitality. Except if you are a Baha’i in Iran, where this kindness can result in torture, imprisonment, or death, both for the offeror and the recipient. The danger springs from the recent escalation of a government-led propaganda campaign meant to instigate…
Photo by Ebi Zandi on Unsplash. Recently, the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) passed a new ruling on the Muslim headscarf. That headscarves cause debate shouldn’t be a surprise. Four years ago, the CJEU dealt with the very same issue: private employers asking Muslim women to remove their headscarves and Muslim women claiming…
Photo by NASA on Unsplash. The Group of Seven nations — Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States — agreed on June 5, 2021 to promote a new global tax system. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) announced on July 1, 2021 that 130 of the 139 countries…
Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash. I. According to their nature, ideas, as purely abstract concepts, are radical intrusions into material existence. They are that which drive us to re-examine and potentially upend our lives on the basis of wholly immaterial considerations. Though there may be both conscious and unconscious gains made for a person’s…
MRI Imaging by Raspbery Vibe. (CC0). If someone is an addict, does that mean he or she is immune from moral responsibility? From substance addiction to addictive behaviors, many addicts blame others, attributing their addiction problem to a source outside their control. A recent example is the case of Robert Aaron Long, the gunman responsible…
Photo by Prisilla Du Preez on Unsplash. Identifying proper boundaries for religious liberty in American public life continues to be a hot-button issue. Stories of friction between religious groups and other members of society have pervaded the headlines, and such conflicts aren’t going away anytime soon. Over the last few years, the Supreme Court has…
Photo by David Monje on Unsplash. Religious traditions that are not historically rooted in the Christo-European culture face particular legal and political challenges that are unprecedented in the post-World War II-era. Despite the establishment of supranational bodies responsible for the promotion of human rights standards and the advancement of civil liberties, liberal democracies have failed…