Topic: US Domestic Issues
“This is nearly 10 years after the tragedy,” says Terri Roberts, the mother of Charlie Roberts, who murdered five Amish school girls in 2006, “and here I am. I’m alive and I am able to move forward because of the response of the Amish, because of forgiveness. I believe that so much light has been brought into such a dark place.”
MoreMuslim leaders spoke out this week after the massacre in Orlando. “We condemn it in the strongest possible terms,” said Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “It violates our principles as Americans and as Muslims.” And Sayyid Syeed, national director of the Islamic Society of North America, observed that “whatever they say about the practice of homosexuality is irrelevant to the fact we are committed to respect the other.” More
More and more churches in Alabama are opposing the high interest charges of payday lenders. “There’s a moral and ethical injunction starting back in the Old Testament going all the way into the New Testament church,” says Rev. Shannon Webster, pastor of Birmingham’s First Presbyterian Church. “There are injunctions against lending at interest in an exorbitant way.” More
“One of our great strengths is to make visible in appropriate ways the migrant men, women, and children we serve,” says Rev. Sean Carroll, SJ, executive director of the Kino Border Initiative, a Catholic ministry in Mexico and the US. “The more visible they become, even to our political leaders, I think that will change their minds and hearts and help them find the political will to pass immigration reform that’s just and humane.” More
“Sometimes the pain that’s resident in the community—it can be overwhelming,” says Rev. David Watkins III, pastor of Greater Bethesda Missionary Baptist Church in Chicago’s Washington Park neighborhood. “However, part of the hope of the gospel is that even in the midst of despair, you always have a way out…This community should be better off because as a church we are in it.” More
“Our argument has been quite simple,” says Rev. Seamus Finn, board chairman of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility. “The more a company is able to integrate a good, solid social and environmental policy and governance policy into their model of business, then they will be around a lot longer.” More
“For us it’s very important to hold onto our faith and to do that in a space where it’s encouraged, to engage your intellect but also to remember it goes with your faith, and they are not separate,” says Aisha Ibrahim, a student at Zaytuna. More
“I would caution us against thinking that being against one group isn’t going to spill over and hurt many more people,” says Dalia Mogahed, a Muslim-American scholar and director of research at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding. More
“If we look back in our families, we find that we’re all immigrants. Whoever they were, they were the stranger, they were the people who were looked upon as foreigners. For us to turn over and suddenly be prejudiced against some newcomers, this is denying our own heritage.” More
Racial diversity is only “one factor among many” in admissions decisions, according to the University of Texas vice president for diversity. But if the Supreme Court decides to abandon racial preferences, what will become of the pursuit of racial justice in education? More