I grew up Catholic. Went to Catholic grade school and high school, got confirmed, went to confession (at least twice!), received communion, ate ham and potato salad in basements—the whole nine yards. Speaking of yards, I can’t recall ever being hit with a yardstick, but I did get punched in the...
Catholics
Kitchen Table Kibitzing is a community series for those who wish to share a virtual kitchen table with other readers of Daily Kos who aren’t throwing pies at one another. Drop by to talk about music, your weather, your garden, or what you cooked for supper…. Newcomers may notice that...
We all pretty much know who Amy Coney Barrett is. I see such super-Catholics on my social media feeds pretty regularly because, well, I went to Catholic grade school and high school, and a lot of my old classmates either haven’t figured out that I’m a filthy secular humanist or,...
One has to remember that an Amendment to the Constitution is PART of the Constitution, and since it is LATER than the original text of the Constitution actually becomes more relevant. And so I remind you that the Bill of Rights was ratified by a Congress including a number of...
It is one of the GOP’s tried and untrue slanders, deployed every time a Republican President nominates an anti-abortion Catholic to the federal judiciary. The GOP and its amen corner claim Democrats are waging a “war on Catholics” and requiring a “religious test” for office. This week’s confirmation theater for...
A new generation of “forward to the past”, anti-modern conflict for which the GOP should pay in November. x “The likely shift in the court’s makeup — from Ginsburg, a liberal icon, to an outspoken conservative — would be the sharpest ideological swing since Clarence Thomas replaced Justice Thurgood Marshall...
I’m not religious. You might say I’m an agnostic with Buddhist leanings — but most people would just call me a heathen. And that’s fine with me. I was raised Catholic, and I’m aware that there’s a campaign called Catholics Come Home, but at this point returning to church would feel...
It’s common on this site to bemoan, make fun of, scratch our heads in wonder, bewail the hypocrisy, and otherwise write off the large number of American evangelicals who voted for Trump and still support him in spite of his womanizing, his profanities, his inability to name books in the...
If you feel as though you are trying to get a sip from a fire hose and are drowning in orange spray tan, here is another dribble of information. Among the frenzied and perpetual fantasies, promises and dreams of President Trump were that Mexico would pay for his Wall to...
A submission for Memorial Day weekend: The Highest and Purest Democracy: Rabbi Roland Gittelsohn’s Iwo Jima Eulogy to his Fallen Comrades Roland Gittelsohn was a Marine Corps chaplain in World War II, and he was on Iwo Jima just after the battle. One of the other chaplains, who was organizing...
Who pays $20,000 for a plane ticket, or a Final Four ticket, or an Inaugural ticket, and should you blame some other country for your own incompetence. And Pence and Trump will still have rallies in Wisconsin next week. x Trump misstated his own policy in an Oval Office address...
The tagline on my profile says, as it has for years: “It is not the business of the state to help its citizens get into heaven nor save them from hell.” Apparently our esteemed Attorney General never read that. Nor has he read the First Amendment. As an op-ed in...
Ever since he showed up on the national stage, Trump has been called — with good reason — a narcissist, a megalomaniac, a disordered personality. But he is also a sadist, and he leads a sadistic base. This point has been raised before on this blog — Trump is Sadistic...
By now, Americans have grown accustomed to incendiary rhetoric from the raging right. Nevertheless, the past week witnessed some truly explosive eruptions from some of the leading lights of the conservative movement. Last Sunday, Donald Trump warned that his impeachment and removal from office could trigger a second civil war. Three...
To many, Omaha Nebraska is where you could buy insurance from the company that sponsored the Wild Kingdom TV show. Henry Fonda and Johny Carson were from Omaha. The liberal billionaire, “Oracle” Warren Buffet, lives in Omaha. Yet for 50 years, Omaha also became the most segregated city in the US,...
Planned Parenthood paid fora poll of Kentuckians to find out their views on abortion rights, and I was surprised by the results: Asked whether it’s important for women in Kentucky to have “access to all of the reproductive health care options available, including abortion,” 65% said yes, according to the...
There is this religious moron by the name of Kunkel who sued the Kentucky state health department for blocking him from going to school without getting a chickenpox vaccination. Kunkel attends a small Catholic school, and there is a religious exemption for vaccinations. However, the exemption also allows the health...
So let me give some background. On May 15 I saw a posting on DC Craigslist for a private high Catholic high school in Hyattsville MD looking for a 12th grade Government teacher. As a DC area resident since 1982, I was pretty sure that the only Catholic high school...
Blase Bonpane (photo credit: R. Colby) By Alan Minsky, Executive Director | Progressive Democrats of America Since I first began working alongside Blase Bonpane around the beginning of this century, he has been one of the most influential people in my life. With his passing, I have made a vow...
This data just dropped, and it’s shocking: x The 2018 GSS was just released and there's some big news. Those of “no religion” (23.1%) are statistically the same size as evangelicals (22.8%). There was also a small resurgence of mainline Protestants, while Catholics are down 3% in the last four...
From the Louisville Courier-Journal: Covington Catholic High School and the Diocese of Covington apologized to the man in the video, identified as Vietnam veteran and Native American elder Nathan Phillips, and said they will take appropriate action, which could include expulsion. This is a possibility, but it will not be...
The Jesuits, a religious order in the Catholic Church, were understandably ecstatic when Donald Trump picked one of their own for nomination to the Supreme Court. (If confirmed, Brett Kavnaugh would be the fifth Catholic judge.) Kavanaugh has repeatedly and prominently highlighted his Jesuit Catholic faith, and even quoted the former Superior General of the...
Well, this is a big Fuck You to the Separation of Church & State: Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley supports repealing a provision in the federal tax code that bars politicking in the pulpit. In an Aug. 21 speech to pastors and church members in St. Louis, the Republican nominee...
The two Democrats running to replace Aaron Schock in Illinois' 18th Congressional district supported action on climate change in a recent debate sponsored by several news organizations. Both candidates mentioned a letter from Pope Francis calling on Catholics to make combating climate change a top priority. Less than a week...
I know quite a number of Pakistanis being a student at Ohio Wesleyan. Not all of them care that much for politics. But of the few who do, there is a general sentiment that Chinese is the new language of the global market. As the US continues to fall in...