Here are the readings.

And my favorite part of the Bible!!!

The Book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ,
the son of David, the son of Abraham.

Abraham became the father of Isaac,
Isaac the father of Jacob,
Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers.
Judah became the father of Perez and Zerah,
whose mother was Tamar.
Perez became the father of Hezron,
Hezron the father of Ram,
Ram the father of Amminadab.
Amminadab became the father of Nahshon,
Nahshon the father of Salmon,
Salmon the father of Boaz,
whose mother was Rahab.
Boaz became the father of Obed,
whose mother was Ruth.
Obed became the father of Jesse,
Jesse the father of David the king.

David became the father of Solomon,
whose mother had been the wife of Uriah.
Solomon became the father of Rehoboam,
Rehoboam the father of Abijah,
Abijah the father of Asaph.
Asaph became the father of Jehoshaphat,
Jehoshaphat the father of Joram,
Joram the father of Uzziah.
Uzziah became the father of Jotham,
Jotham the father of Ahaz,
Ahaz the father of Hezekiah.
Hezekiah became the father of Manasseh,
Manasseh the father of Amos,
Amos the father of Josiah.
Josiah became the father of Jechoniah and his brothers
at the time of the Babylonian exile.

After the Babylonian exile,
Jechoniah became the father of Shealtiel,
Shealtiel the father of Zerubbabel,
Zerubbabel the father of Abiud.
Abiud became the father of Eliakim,
Eliakim the father of Azor,
Azor the father of Zadok.
Zadok became the father of Achim,
Achim the father of Eliud,
Eliud the father of Eleazar.
Eleazar became the father of Matthan,
Matthan the father of Jacob,
Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary.
Of her was born Jesus who is called the Christ.

I really love that passage–and not just because it’s fun to watch the lectors stumble over all those Hebrew and Aramaic names.  I think it’s great to celebrate family, our continuity with the past, and that’s what this passage does: it establishes Jesus as clearly a Jewish figure (the descendant of Abraham–while Luke makes him more universal, the direct descendant of Adam.)  The point though, is that Jesus is not a NEW thing–he is a continuation of God’s covenant and a connection with the past…

From an interview posted in The Moderate Voice:

The main subject he talked about in the interview was the role of the Labor Party. Noor rightfully points out that the Labor Party finds itself stuck between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, they dare not criticize Muslims - not even ‘conservative’ Muslims - for fear of being called “anti-Muslim,” and on the other hand they dare no longer defend the fundamentalists based on the idea of multiculturalism either. He went on to say that Labor has, by doing so, allowed the conservative parties and right-wingers like Wilders to take monopolize the debate.

A great point: we must encourage saving (though, let’s be fair, not just for the poor–I know almost nobody in my age group who saves!)

In 1990, newspapers around the country profiled the story of Grace Capetillo, a welfare mom from Milwaukee who, after managing to save $3,000 in the bank, was hauled into court by the county Department of Social Services and charged with fraud. Having breached the limit on allowable assets, Ms. Capetillo was found guilty and ordered to pay a fine of $1,000, spend down another $1,000 of the money she had worked hard to save, and promise not to save again if she wanted to stay on assistance.

The country was rightfully outraged; the system was clearly broken. Yet today, 17 years later and a decade since welfare reform, asset limits continue to send mixed messages to the poor.

Last month on Capitol Hill, Rep. John Conyers (D) of Michigan introduced a bill that aims to reverse decades of this self-defeating policy toward the poor. In order to qualify for government assistance, from cash welfare and food stamps to disability income, low-income families must demonstrate they are not only income-poor but asset-poor as well.

These rules were understandably designed to preserve assistance for those truly in need. Yet, while policymakers created an asset test to keep hypothetical, unemployed trust fund brats from collecting government checks, these rules are sending a dangerous message to low-income families: Do not save.

So what’s the difference between the milky way and a human?  Not much, really.

Here’s a great post on the definition of what life actually is.  Thoughts?

It’s super-important, and it’s pretty much dead.  The Man wins again.

(Sorry for no posts yesterday folks.  I was super-sick and mostly in the bahtroom.)

Here’s an interesting post on men and abortion.  It’s funny: “unabashedly pro-choice” is what men have to be to be entitled to be hurt by their girlfriend’s, wife’s, or partner’s abortion.  It’s good that the article is able to point out that abortion harms people, including (shockingly!) even men, but isn’t it possible we could say that abortion should happen less often then?  I’m not even saying pro-choicers should change their mind to abortion is illegal: but what if we just all admit that abortion is painful, that it hurts people, and that, well, it’d be better if abortions were much more rare?

There is a growing, though still inadequate, movement to address men’s experiences of abortion. At the forefront is Shostak, author of Men and Abortion, Losses, Lessons, and Loves, which is based on a survey involving more than a thousand men who responded to questionnaires in the waiting rooms of 30 clinics located in 18 states. Other books are not explicitly aimed at but address men, such as Unspeakable Losses: Understanding the Experience of Pregnancy Loss, Miscarriage & Abortion, by Kim Kluger-Bell, and The Choices We Made, by Angela Bonavoglia. Online, pro-choice men can find support at www.menandabortion.com, a site founded in 2006 and still in development.

There is a price to both men and women when men don’t feel supported or safe to talk about their experiences with a partner’s abortions. Men can be pushed further into anxious masculinity, subconsciously convinced that if the world acts like their feelings don’t matter, they’ll just pretend not to have them. Women are then burdened with both the physical responsibility of the abortion and the entire emotional responsibility of processing what it means.

If both men and women feel like they have a role in the procedure and healing — however that’s interpreted by partners, depending on their spiritual and/or political beliefs — we will be healthier as a whole. Perhaps men, freed from the shackles of silence, will also be more prone to help out in the important work of keeping Roe v. Wade intact and abortion safer and less stigmatized for everyone.

I don’t think so.  A lot of people want to move to just reading online, and, well: at grad school, a lot of articles are available only online, but it’s just easier to read them in my hands.

That’s entirely a social context though.  I prefer reading papers online now.  So time will tell.

Wow.  A lot of bad press about the Legion.  I could explain it all, but it’d be easier to read it here, here, and here.  (The middle one is not an article, but rather an organization against the Legion, mostly of people who were in it).  Here’s the Legion’s site.

I just went to my friend Ryan’s vows Mass (he recently finished novitiate) and their novitiate is only about 30 miles north of me.  They’re all pretty conservative (much more so than I) but also admirably pious, charitable, friendly–really wonderful people.

Honesty: their hair is all parted the same way and all of them together (there are a lot of seminarians) in cassocks does look a bit anachronistic.  The school is CLEARLY a finishing school in many sense: here’s how you eat, sit, do your hair, etc. to enable middle-class kids to get into the elite circles to do their religious work.  And that’s, you know, an interesting approach.  But I’m not sure how different that is from sending your kid to boarding school, and Catholic liberals aren’t up-in-arms about that.

There are a lot of larger issues about the Legion that I’m sure deserve scrutiny and criticism (in terms of its institutional life).  But the novices and seminarians I’ve met are all inspiring folks full of zeal for their vocations–and that’s really wonderful.

(Of course–and here’s the big rub–how much critical thinking is expressed and taught?  Or is the Legion always, ipso facto, right?  It’s tricky–being in a religious order like the Legion or Jesuits, because they are modeled on the military, is like being in the military.  You trust your superiors no matter what–and that can really help you, but, if you have a bad superior…)

Many of you might remember a wonderful blogger here named Theologienne.  She sent me a great link on Christian legal advocacy.

It’s time to reflect on the Jewish year.

A schedule.

And a reflection from Ami Eden:

Too often the High Holiday process of reflecting on the year gone by can produce a frustratingly vanilla verdict: Not much has changed.

But thanks to Jimmy Carter, gay-friendly rabbis and deep-pocketed donors, the Hebrew year 5767 turned out to be a time of major transition for the American Jewish community.