The bishops hope that these new policies will prove powerful and effective in nationalizing and systematizing structures already in place. Advocates don’t trust the Church, especially when there is no required lay involvement in the reporting process.
Unless the money that will be made from marijuana’s federal legalization is used for robust community reinvestment in affected residential communities across America, it fails the moral litmus test of social justice and pumps oxygen into racial wealth disparities. Without this reinvestment, America will once again be blowing smoke into the face of those who have historically been most victimized by the criminalization of marijuana. The abovementioned federal legalization proposal includes the development of a community reinvestment fund to specifically benefit communities most ravished by the marijuana ban, and the decades-long failed war on drugs. The architects of the bill outlined some potential funding areas: job training, post-incarceration and expungement services, public libraries and community centers, youth programming, and health education.
The CAQ is using its majority status in Parliament to concretize the secularization of Quebec, a process that began in the 1960s through the “Quiet Revolution” when the Quebec government began separating its institutions from the leadership of the Catholic Church. In the last decade, various Quebec political parties, including the Liberals, have made several legislative attempts to address state neutrality that have either been delayed in the courts or have failed because of public dissent.
The document also issues a strong defense for the protection of the environment in the Amazon, deforestation, illegal mining, and development projects that threaten native cultures and the delicate ecosystem vital for the planet.
White violence in all forms must be named, particularly white, male violence.
Our new look, changes in the SBC, the real meaning of identity, hope for the long haul work of justice, and more in the Weekly Wrap.
As I was growing up in an evangelical church, one of my pastors’ favorite scriptures to use to wake up a congregation and remind us to keep going was the “run-the-race” scripture. In Hebrews 12, we are instructed to “run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.” But I was never a runner — or, in fact, had any athletically inclined bone in my body — and I desperately needed a different metaphor, something that I felt would teach me to carry on my faith in a sustainable way.
Good theater contains a strain of that gospel antidote, that powerful tradition of trying to name and recognize our demons and human propensities. The earnestness in story that pairs what we believe with what we do, can serve as a way to handle truths about ourselves and our dealings that make us uncomfortable. Often written off as fluffy and as a less effective means of activism, the tradition of plays and musicals has the power to stage an inner confrontation in real time, asking the audience to contend with a hard truth or recasting a social norm we seldom question.