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This Monday the Senate Committee on Health and Human Services (HHS) of the Texas Legislature heard more than 13 hours of testimony regarding SB1 (Senate Bill 1), a bill designed to “regulat[e]… abortion procedures, providers, and facilities.”

In US prisons, stays in solitary confinement often exceed years and turn into tens of years. “The reality is stunning,” says Markle Downton, “and it certainly helps to makes sense of why people who are incarcerated in California feel the situation is dire enough that it’s necessary to put their lives on the line to call for reform.”

An update…

This summer’s victories toward LGBT equality do not change much for professors and students at some Christian colleges. And not looking good if you’re a gay Boy Scout who’s hit voting age.

The right to erect a monument, for any cause, is an opportunity. It’s a chance to lend dignity and consequence to a public space. A monument is also an aesthetic opportunity. It doesn’t have to be beautiful, but a successful monument makes it hard to imagine its setting without it. The American Atheists monument fails on both counts.

The July 1st international edition of Time magazine has added fuel to the fire with a cover photo of the fundamentalist Burmese monk Wirathu, calling him “The Face of Buddhist Terror.” Protesters took to the streets this weekend, and President Thein Sein officially banned the magazine, citing concern about the “recurrence of religious and racial conflict.” Buddhist Terror? Harsh voices of intolerance have become almost daily news from…

Though Craig is correct that his argument is “simple,” he is wrong to believe that simplicity makes it good. Indeed, the suggestion that terms and concepts are immune to redefinition is simply… false. It demands an unflattering comparison to Rick Santorum, who once stumped around the nation declaring that a “ napkin is a napkin.”

The numbers may be low compared to global-scale disasters of recent years, but there is a wrenching poignancy to what is happening in Uttarakhand right now. Many of the forces that frame daily life in South Asia are suddenly on display like a raw wound: the wages of development and globalization, the power of the natural world, divine agency, altruism, self-interest, and the political nature of both government action and religious ritual.

People who want to stop abortion are quick to publicly ask God’s aid in ending a practice they think is murder. It’s easy to find examples of their public prayers. But people who believe women ought to be in charge of when they bring life into the world are less apt to pray their cause publicly. Many of those people are acting out of religious faith that is every bit as deeply held.

Walt Whitman counseled each of us to “dismiss whatever insults your soul.” My fervent hope is that the new Commission on the Humanities and Social Sciences report—a project of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences that was “commissioned” or “requested” by a quartet of DC pols—will be dismissed accordingly.