Shopping for Your Kids, Bioethically Speaking
Questions about the ethics of surrogacy span biology, psychology, class, and the law—and it’s not even clear where the authority to answer these questions might lie.
Morality is Not Necessarily Good
Ten questions for philosopher Hans-Georg Moeller whose new book explains how the language of morality, or of ethical purity, distorts our ability to tackle the toughest social and political problems.
GMO or No: Problematic Intersections of Religion, Biotechnology, and Food
Can a genetically altered hot dog be kosher? Can a vegetarian eat a tomato that has animal DNA in it? Is modified corn just another instance of colonialism? These and other questions are broached in a new anthology, sure to make excellent Thanksgiving dinner conversation.
A Daily Utopia: Creating Our Moral Values Every Day
The author of a new book talks to RD about the radical that lies beneath our everyday practices, whether ethics requires religion, and the “education of desire.”
Killing One Primate to Save Another: The Ethics of Animal Rights
A disturbing story emerged this week of a scientist leaving his research out of fear for his and his family’s lives. What are our responsibilities in this area and what do our traditions have to say about it?
Is Universal Coverage the only moral touchstone in health care reform? Religious progressives need to think again.
Do Atheists Borrow Religion’s Morality?
Does morality come from religion or is it merely “the language games of one’s time”? Are the most basic moral boundaries we evolved that make life easier and less chaotic a reflection of the character of God? If there is no God, or if He doesn’t care about us, then our common morality is still the result of practical, reality-based needs, which also “teach” that a good life depends on the “Do unto others…” ethic.
America, Religious Values, and the Death Penalty; Or, If it Was Good Enough for Jesus and Socrates...
The United States is still using the logic of vengeance in enforcing the death penalty, and it is the only Western country within its primary coalitions to do so. When did it start? How can it end? What is wrong with us?
Death With Dignity: Combatting Religious Opposition to Physician-Assisted Suicide
Modern medicine can prolong the lives of dying people, but in doing so it often prolongs suffering. Do religious arguments against suicide apply in these tragic cases?
Would Manny Ramirez’s Clone Use Steroids?
Unless you are a geneticist the answer may surprise you. The ethical problems with cloning turn out to be the result of some confusion about what cloning is, and isn’t.
RDPulpit: EFCA Needed to Stop Employers from Bearing False Witness
In addition to the direct consequences for workers and their families, one study estimated that for every worker fired, 395 coworkers got the message: attempt to organize and you’ll get fired too.
Talmud v. Torture: The Jewish Case Against “Enhanced Interrogation”
During the Bush Administration, Rabbi Melissa Weintraub wrote a definitive condemnation of torture according to Talmudic teaching and Jewish collective memory. With the release of the CIA “torture memos,” these essays are worth revisiting. And, as Israel celebrates the 61st anniversary of its independence how does the Jewish nation itself stack up to these ideals?
How Much is a (Progressive) Pastor Worth?
When New York City’s fabled Riverside Church brought in a new, evangelical pastor with a pay package of $600K it made roaring headlines and sparked a lawsuit. Our writer attended the Sunday service and reports back on the "controversy."
Listening and Supporting: The Spirituality of Nurses
A Massachusetts nurse loses her job after talking to a dying patient about religion. What does this case reveal about the place of sprituality in American hospitals?
Is Torture Utilitarian?
As politicians argue, and our pragmatist-in-chief tries to find an angle, we can agree that not all moral dilemmas can be reduced to a cost-benefit analysis of pleasure and pain. There are some kinds of pain a morally serious person ought never to inflict.
I Owe, Therefore I Am: Why Struggling Against the Banks is a Holy Obligation
When we take the approach that “all are sinners,” we confuse big-time criminality with small-time folly. This moral obfuscation allows the far greater misfeasance of corporate creditors to get airbrushed out of the picture.
RDPulpit: Torture Needs You
Relieved that Guantanamo Bay is closing? Don’t rest easy. Until we accept our collective responsibility for torture, and the fact that it requires not just the torturer's denial, but ours, it will prevail.
Play to Extinction: Religious Groups Unite Against Predatory Gambling
What could James Dobson’s Focus on the Family and the League of Women Voters possibly have in common? They’re both members of a coalition to raise awareness of the devastating effects of, and to block, state-sponsored casino gambling in Massachusetts.
MLK SPECIAL: Awake From Dreaming—King to Obama
In a series of short essays, special to Religion Dispatches, religious historians, philosophers, and ethicists celebrate Obama’s place in American history while heeding Dr. King’s continued prophetic challenge for our nation.
A new study reveals that religious professionals are not being trained to deal with the most basic aspects of the sexual dimension of congregants’ lives. Not acceptable when it comes to issues like AIDS/HIV, workplace ethics, domestic violence, and LGBTQ needs.
Physicians, “Conscience,” and the Denial of Options
New federal regulations, enacted by the lame-duck Bush administration, privilege the religious or moral scruples of physicians over a patient’s right to treatment. 40 million Americans have physicians who will not present them with all the options for treatment.
The “G-Word”: Genocide’s Slippery Nature
Once the camps are built and the trains are running—once the machetes have been distributed and the hate radio is broadcasting—it’s too late to respond. A Thanksgiving report on the state of our (un)ethical response to genocide.
History in the Making: Religion, Race and Gender in the Presidential Election
A distinguished scholar and minister reflects on the persistence of racism in US political history, on the role of religion in political culture, and on the fulfillment of long-awaited vision of a world community built on justice and freedom.
Wendy Gonaver’s lessons on the American Constitution may soon include her own story: the refusal to sign a loyalty oath designed to root out communists in public jobs whose effect is to weed out religious believers, particularly Quakers and Jehovah’s Witnesses.
Getting Wright Wrong: Preaching is Not Policy
Anyone who thinks that full agreement with your pastor is necessary has never been to church...