Category Archives: Pope

Are Penis Thieves Real?

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Seinfeld's George Costanza fretted about "shrinkage." But are penis thieves really a bigger problem? [Credit: businessinsider.com]

Sein­feld’s George Costan­za fret­ted about “shrink­age.” But could penis thieves pose a big­ger prob­lem? [Cred­it: businessinsider.com]

“One of the prob­lems,” author Frank Bures said in a recent Atlantic inter­view, “is this whole dis­tinc­tion between real and not real.”

Bures is the author of The Geog­ra­phy of Mad­ness: Penis Thieves, Voodoo Death, and the Search for the Mean­ing of the World’s Strangest Syn­dromes.  His book exam­ines con­di­tions that the DSM‑V, a man­u­al used to diag­nose and clas­si­fy men­tal dis­or­ders, terms “cul­ture-bound syn­dromes.” Con­tin­ue read­ing →

“Episodes,” Hollywood And Reverend Al

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Season 4 of "Episodes," premieres tonight, a funny, smart and dead-on satire of Hollywood. [Credit: Showtime]

Sea­son 4 of “Episodes,” pre­mieres tonight, a fun­ny, smart and dead-on satire of Hol­ly­wood. [Cred­it: Showtime]

MATT LEBLANC’S EX-WIFE: You were arrest­ed for dri­ving drunk with our kids in the car!

LEBLANC: Yeah, well, when you say it that way, it sounds terrible.

Scene from Sea­son 3 of “Episodes”

The fourth sea­son of “Episodes” pre­mieres tonight on Show­time, promis­ing anoth­er sump­tu­ous feast of Hol­ly­wood send-ups. David Crane’s (“Friends,” “Joey”) hand­i­work has it all: self-obsessed actors, self-impor­tant exec­u­tives, mawk­ish phoni­ness and blood­less betray­als, all set among ubiq­ui­tous lies and decep­tions.  Crane’s satire is pitch-per­fect: over­drawn enough to be fun­ny, but real enough to be (almost) true. Con­tin­ue read­ing →

Tsunami And The Triumph Of Hope

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Ten years after a tsunami ravaged villages like this on the Indian Ocean Coast, towns have been rebuilt, lives repaired. [Credit: endignorance.org]

Ten years after a tsuna­mi rav­aged vil­lages like this that line the Indi­an Ocean coast­line, towns have been rebuilt, lives repaired. [Cred­it: endignorance.org]

A decade has passed since a tsuna­mi dev­as­tat­ed vil­lages in 13 Asian coun­tries, which remind­ed me that some­where I have a plas­tic sand­wich bag filled with rupees.

The rupees are among the memen­toes of a woman I cher­ished.  She went to Kudanku­lam, a fish­ing vil­lage on the south­ern tip of the Indi­an sub­con­ti­nent, ten years ago to pro­vide med­ical care to the tsunami’s sur­vivors. Con­tin­ue read­ing →

Ukraine And The Echoes of Ravenna

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Ravenna's magnificent mosaics were realized during a time of upheaval that echoes today in Ukraine.

Raven­na’s mag­nif­i­cent mosaics were real­ized dur­ing a time of upheaval that echoes today in Ukraine.

There is some­thing odd about how the ancient mosaicist of Raven­na’s church of San Vitale tells the sto­ry of Moses receiv­ing the Ten Com­mand­ments.  When God presents him with the law, Moses turns away.  His gaze is fixed on the mosa­ic below, in which God pre­vents Abra­ham from sac­ri­fic­ing his son Isaac, instruct­ing him to offer a ram instead, thus ful­fill­ing the patriarch’s expec­ta­tion that God him­self would pro­vide an aton­ing sacrifice.

San Vitale’s mosaics are sixth cen­tu­ry mas­ter­pieces of light and col­or.  They con­vey the Chris­t­ian gospel with inef­fa­ble elo­quence.  They also express polit­i­cal aspi­ra­tions, long-for­got­ten visions of what Europe might be.  Their dis­ap­point­ments rever­ber­ate today in the streets of Kiev, Odessa and Donet­sk. Con­tin­ue read­ing →

The Good News Pope Francis Missed

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Pope Francis's inaugural encyclical celebrated the gospel and excoriated markets. But did he overlook some very good news? [Credit: Telegraph]

Pope Fran­cis’s inau­gur­al encycli­cal cel­e­brat­ed the gospel and exco­ri­at­ed mar­kets. But did he over­look some very good news? [Cred­it: Telegraph]

In writ­ing about the joy of the gospel, Pope Fran­cis over­looked some very good news – about mar­kets, about com­pas­sion, about poverty.

His first encycli­cal (Evan­gelii Gaudi­um, “The Joy of The Gospel”) has drawn atten­tion less for its focus on mis­sions than for its eco­nom­ic pro­nounce­ments. Pres­i­dent Oba­ma favor­ably cit­ed the doc­u­ment in his recent remarks on eco­nom­ic mobil­i­ty, while some con­ser­v­a­tive com­men­ta­tors have offered up harsh crit­i­cisms. Con­tin­ue read­ing →