![Spiritual betrayal on the part of one [religion] affects the faith of us all. —R. Abraham Heschel](https://mackenzian.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/HeschelX.jpg)
Remember the story of the little red hen? The little red hen asks for help with reaping and grinding wheat and making and baking bread, but there are no takers. “Who will help me bake the bread?” she asks her farm friends. “Not I,” they each tell her, and they leave her to complete each […]
Unbecoming activism
In the second chapter of Confronting Injustice, Umair Muhammad recounts the United States’ role in the evolution of Somalian terrorist group al-Shabab. I wrote briefly about this group six weeks ago in an article on the recent film Eye in the Sky. Like the other decentralized MENA terrorist group that need not be named, al-Shabab […]
Returning to Butler
I started my winter vacation tonight and so am on my way back to Maryland. For the week at home, I picked a few books off my shelf, including Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Talents. I held Parable of the Talents in my hands. Then I thought about this week’s headlines and I put it […]
Remote war and responsibility
Contains spoilers for Eye in the Sky. The United States recently expanded its military activity in the Horn of Africa. Among the regional groups it now openly targets in the name of post-9/11 counter-terrorism is Al-Shabab (The Youth), a decentralized network based in Somalia and operating around the Somali-Kenyan border. The US has in fact […]
“The first rewrite of the draft of history”
Tom Toles has drawn editorial cartoons for the Washington Post since 2002. The Post published “The first rewrite of the draft of history” in 2005 after British papers broke news about “highly sensitive” meetings of British intelligence officers, Cabinet members, political strategists, and communications specialists, and representatives of the United States. At these meetings, later minuted in […]
Interview: Exvangelical and Keisha
Earlier this fall, I had an extended conversation with Blake Chastain, host of the podcast Exvangelical. Exvangelical is a weekly podcast that shares stories of people who grew up or converted into Evangelical Christianity and have since built lives of faith and beyond faith outside of the subculture. Episode 14, “A Safe Place for Questions,” runs a […]
