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If Breivik is insane, then his insanity lies in taking fully to heart the widely fluctuating language of right wing Islamophobes who perceive an existential threat to our freedom and life, a Manichean vision of an uncompromising evil fighting a good that has to be equally unsparing in warfare.

A flock, maybe, but certainly not sheep; nuances of the pulpit-pew relationship.

Collision on the interfaith highway…

A new book investigates the history of the crucifix in early Christianity and develops a political theology of this-worldly salvation.

French President Sarkozy declared recently that the burqa “will not be welcome on our territory,” as it is a symbol of the enslavement of women. If the president is trying to foster equality of women, is this the best way to go about it?

Mortgage companies, the New York Times reports, make money by keeping people in delinquency. In this way, the minorities who were targeted for subprime loans in the first place are being exploited a second time.

While it is tempting to dismiss professional athletes as overpaid ingrates, how many of us have to endure what amounts to 70 car accidents each Sunday? If Michael Vick were a janitor, he’d be back at work by now.

A recent poll showed that white evangelicals are the religious group most likely to support torture. How can that be?

I’m not meant to feel that the Good Samaritan parable is “helpful” to me. I’m meant to feel indicted along with the legal expert, the bandits on the road, and the smug élites who pass by the wounded victim while posting links to savvy articles in the New Yorker and the Atlantic on the verdict in the Trayvon Martin murder trial.

When we read of Enlightenment efforts to rehabilitate the image of Islam alongside the fact that outgoing Rep. Michele Bachmann raised more than $1 million in 25 days from a Muslim-themed witch hunt, it’s easy to ask how such openness could curdle into such paranoia. But that would be too simple.