—Part I— Many Christian theologians of the past two thousand years would likely have supported a wealth tax, but not for the reasons given by the current Democratic presidential candidates. Using the tax system to redistribute resources from the wealthy to the poor has been a matter of controversy in American history, but it has…
Cover Image: U.S. Congressman Mike Pompeo in 2011. Gage Skidmore / Wikimedia CC BY-SA 3.0 On May 30, 2019, Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards—the only Democratic governor of a deep-south state—signed into law a “heartbeat bill” banning abortion after six weeks. In defending his decision, which contravenes the national Democratic Party’s platform plank on securing reproductive health and…
Bladensburg World War I Memorial. Bladensburg, Maryland. Flickr. CC BY 2.0. In its recent decision in American Legion v. American Humanist Association, the Supreme Court has once again drawn conclusions grounded in a faulty reading of history. Ruling 7-2 that a 40-foot cross located along a highway in Bladensburg, Maryland does not violate First Amendment…
Cover image: Palace of Westminster, London. 2007. Wikimedia Commons. (CC BY-SA 2.5). To most Americans, the Brexit phenomenon is a uniquely European enigma. Images of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s unruly tuft of blonde hair and Speaker of the House of Commons John Bercow’s fuming face while moderating an argumentative Parliament are now ubiquitous on…
Note: This and other essays in this series were originally delivered as part of the Leadership and Multifaith Program symposium on Law, Religious Identity, and Public Discourse held at Georgia Tech on September 26, 2019. In my work as the curator of the Museum of History and Holocaust Education (MHHE) at Kennesaw State University, I…
Note: This and other essays in this series were originally delivered as part of the Leadership and Multifaith Program symposium on Law, Religious Identity, and Public Discourse held at Georgia Tech on September 26, 2019. I agree with much of Judge Dhanidina’s rather dour diagnosis of our current societal ills. We are indeed currently experiencing a crisis…
Note: This and other essays in this series were originally delivered as part of the Leadership and Multifaith Program symposium on Law, Religious Identity, and Public Discourse held at Georgia Tech on September 26, 2019. There is a current crisis of confidence in our democracy and secular institutions. We have seen a simultaneous dwindling of…
The First Amendment is designed, in part to prevent – or at least severely limit the degree to which religion can be directly expressed through law and policy and the extent to which law can be used to define and control religious belief and practice. Nevertheless, some religious groups often seek to push against the…
Can an individual truly be a citizen of a nation and simultaneously a global citizen? For the 1.8 million Muslims of the world, and especially the estimated 4 million in the United States, the question is deeper than simple political allegiance; it goes to the core of belonging and self-perception. Citizenship, whether as a political…