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  • Thou Mayest0

    It couldn’t have been easy growing up as the son of literary giant John Steinbeck, particularly for the child who shared his father’s name. Despite John Steinbeck IV forging an impressive path as a writer on his own merits—after being drafted into the Vietnam War, he worked as a journalist and war correspondent, later writing

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  • Terrorism in Canada0

    On October 20, 2014, 25-year-old Martin Couture-Rouleau slammed his car into a group of soldiers in the parking lot of a Canada shopping center in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec, killing two. In the pursuit that followed, he was shot and killed when he got out of his wrecked car and brandished a knife. Then two days later

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  • Perception and Reality0

    The Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling last month in Obergefell v. Hodges,1 holding that state bans on same-sex marriages violated the Fourteenth Amendment, was undoubtedly an important constitutional decision. It meant different things for different parties. Three of the dissenting justices, 2 along with many commentators, noted their grave concerns that Justice Anthony Kennedy’s majority opinion

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  • Our Common Home0

    As Pope Francis visited the United States for the first time—addressing a joint session of Congress as well as the United Nations during his September 22-27 stay—his recent narrative on the global environment provided much grist for talking points and debate. Even before he spoke in the United States, however, the pope said he hoped

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  • Courtship Between Church and State0

    In September 2015 Pope Francis I made history by addressing a joint session of the United States Congress. His address to the U.S. Congress was historic for several reasons. Not only is he the first pope to speak before the bicameral legislature, but also his actions call into question the American concept of separation of

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  • Behold the Man0

    September 24, 2015! A date I will not forget, and a date marked by the significance of the events. I have put it away somewhere deep in my memory alongside the day President Kennedy was assassinated and the day the twin towers fell. It was just as historic. Many great and powerful leaders have addressed

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  • If the Cap Fits0

    A Sikh wearing a turban, a Hasidic Jew wearing a hat, a Muslim wearing a hijab, and a Catholic nun in a habit walk into an Abercrombie & Fitch interview: not the beginning of a cringe-worthy joke but rather a hypothetical by Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito to Abercrombie’s lawyer. The context was oral argument in

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  • Walking the Line On Religion0

    John Ellis “Jeb” Bush, son of former president George H. W. Bush, brother of former president George W. Bush, was slow in declaring his formal intention of running for president in the 2016 presidential election, but that did not stop people from speculating. You can hardly blame them. For one thing, in keeping with the

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  • RFRA Again0

    When Indiana governor Mike Pence held a press conference in order to clarify the Indiana Religious Freedom Restoration Act , criticism became viral. There has been ever more discussion and criticism of the law since. These RFRA fights are the definition of a church-state/religious freedom issue, and I felt compelled to write about it. However,

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