In Washington, a new piece of legislation glides forward on patriotic branding and moral ambition. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, as it’s called, promises economic growth, national renewal, and family empowerment. But beneath the shimmering language of prosperity lies a troubling philosophy — one that recasts the U.S. citizen as a market participant above all else and reshapes public policy into a liturgy for the god of the economy.
If it’s not obvious: I genuinely enjoy celebrating July Fourth. Yet I know that many Americans — including Christians who share my commitment to social justice — have a far more complicated relationship with the holiday. And I get that reluctance. So often, celebrating Independence Day is wrapped in a weaponized, politicized form of patriotism which allows no room for critiquing the real harms and contradictions of our nation. But I think it’s a mistake for us to cede patriotism to those who turn it into a poisonous blend of nationalism and ethnocentrism, fixated on blood and soil and fueled by fear of “the other.”
I’ve interviewed celebrities and entertainers before, and my main complaint is always this: They tend to dodge tough topics, which then results in pretty dull conversations.
So when I got on the phone with Christian hip-hop artist Dylan Phillips, whose stage name is nobigdyl., I thought getting him to say anything interesting would be about as hard as fishing for catfish.
But I didn't have to fish long before I realized that nobigdyl. was more than willing to tackle difficult subjects.
The manosphere and parallel trends like the tradwife (traditional wife) movement — led by influencers who idealize marriage, motherhood and domesticity — are impacting even socially conscious students who say it’s hard to avoid this content brimming with toxic messages about gender. Over a half-dozen students told The 19th that after the 2024 election, which saw the manosphere blamed for young men’s rightward shift, they noticed changes in their classmates’ behavior — an uptick in sexist remarks, a sense of entitlement to girls’ attention and schadenfreude that yet another woman lost the presidency.
Sojourners spoke with DeBlois about the film’s relevancy, the importance of wonder in the creative process, and filmmaking as an act of faith.
The Supreme Court dealt a blow on Friday to the power of federal judges by restricting their ability to grant broad legal relief in cases as the justices acted in a legal fight over President Donald Trump's bid to limit birthright citizenship, ordering lower courts that blocked the policy to reconsider the scope of their orders.
New York City Comptroller Brad Lander was arrested by masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on June 17. At a lower Manhattan courtroom, Lander and his staff were attempting to escort a migrant after his court hearing. Seen repeatedly asking ICE agents to produce a judicial warrant, and asserting that they couldn’t arrest an American citizen, Lander was roughly detained and later released, the most recent in a string of Democratic politicians arrested by federal authorities.
Celine Song is just two films into her career, but she’s already established herself as a storyteller who infuses the tumult of modern love with ancient wisdom, and a kind of transcendence that breathes poetry into a disenchanted world.
We also need to be clear: Iran did not possess a nuclear weapon. Iran was enriching uranium needed for such a weapon and had recently increased its production, but intelligence assessments concluded they had not made a final decision to produce a bomb. In fact, the assessment said Iran would be more likely to produce a weapon if the U.S. attacked its uranium supply.
