Category Archives: Religion

Why Do They Oppose Gay Marriage? Part 3 In A Very Infrequently Updated And Rather Repetitive Series

Posted on March 12, 2015 by Ampersand

From “Public Opinion, the Courts, and Same-sex Marriage: Four Lessons Learned” by Brian Powell, Natasha Yurk Quadlin and Oren Pizmony-Levy, in Social Forces (2015) volume 2 pages 3-12. (Pdf link.) Because I don’t believe God intended them to be that … Continue reading →

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Reza Aslan Makes a Lot of Sense Defending Islam. The CNN Anchors Sound Like Islamaphobic Bigots.

Posted on October 6, 2014 by Richard Jeffrey Newman

Author’s note: I’ve edited the title of this post to reflect more accurately the point I wanted to make. Reza Aslan is responding here to this rant by Bill Maher: It’s important to point out that Maher is right: Muslims who engage in … Continue reading →

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Texas Kindergarden Sends Five-Year-Old Home Because He Has Awesome Hair

Posted on September 4, 2014 by Ampersand

This story is sort of an intesectionality jackpot, combining as it does elements of racism, religious bigotry, and sexism. For five-year-old Malachi Wilson, the first day of kindergarten will always be one he remembers. As it turns out, Monday, which … Continue reading →

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Would We Be Living in a Better World if the Tyrants of the Past Had Never Existed?

Posted on August 26, 2014 by Richard Jeffrey Newman

When Someone is Driven to Murder, Where Does the Responsibility Lie? It’s been a very long time since someone called me a bleeding-heart liberal, a label that was never complimentary and always carried with it a connotation not simply of … Continue reading →

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Everyone Hates Atheists Except Jews And Atheists

Posted on July 16, 2014 by Ampersand

Pew has polled Americans about how warmly they feel towards other religious groups. The graph to the left shows the results sorted by political party. It’s not surprising that Republicans really, really don’t like atheists. What’s more surprising is that … Continue reading →

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Writing a Poem is a Confrontation with the Unknowable

Posted on June 20, 2014 by Richard Jeffrey Newman

It’s been a long time since I believed in a god like the biblical one I learned as a child that I was supposed to love and fear, respect and obey. I’ve written a little bit about why I stopped believing, and I’ve written out … Continue reading →

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Farid al-Din Attar: A Reading Journal 6

Posted on July 6, 2013 by Richard Jeffrey Newman

Here’s another quote from The Conference of the Birds: But think of some new pilgrim, some young boy, Whose boldness comes from mere excess of joy; He has no certain knowledge of the Way, And what seems rudeness is but … Continue reading →

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One of My Favorite Poems by Saadi of Shiraz

Posted on June 15, 2013 by Richard Jeffrey Newman

I’ve been thinking about this poem a lot lately, because what it says could easily have been labeled heresy by the authorities of Saadi’s time, which was 13th century Iran, and an accusation of heresy could, conceivably, have gotten him … Continue reading →

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Farid al-Din Attar: A Reading Journal 5

Posted on June 8, 2013 by Richard Jeffrey Newman

When I was in my twenties, a friend and I used to talk all the time about how impoverished the English vocabulary for love is, not just in the sense that we use the word love to talk about our … Continue reading →

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Farid al-Din Attar: A Reading Journal 4

Posted on April 13, 2013 by Richard Jeffrey Newman

When I was a teenager and thought I wanted to be a rabbi, I took great comfort in the fact that the god of the Jewish people did not have a body. It was, of course, confusing to me that … Continue reading →

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