Everybody behead an artist day

A few months ago, we covered the free speech campaign called “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day.” This was the campaign launched by a Seattle cartoonist who was disappointed in Comedy Central’s censorship of a South Park cartoon that, well, didn’t depict Muhammad. But it came too close for comfort and the media network engaged in censorship. Reason Magazine ended up picking up the ball and running with it and you can see the winners of the contest there, as well as some great discussion of the back story.


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A tale of travel

I’m down here in Houston where my church body — the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod — is having its 64th triennial convention. This is the second convention I’ve attended as an adult and it’s always a lot of fun to catch up with folks from across the country and have those in-depth conversations about theology and practice.


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Vague mission worker on a vague mission

In the mythology of journalism, there is this story about a chart that is — or so it is said — hanging on the wall of a generic Associated Press bureau. The chart is supposed to help editors figure out the news value of disasters that take place around the world, when it comes time to decide which stories end up on page one and which ones are buried inside.


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Wow, that's a subtle label!

If one looks up “reform” in a dictionary, it’s obvious that, when used as a label, this is a pretty good finger-pointing word, a term that separates the good guys from the bad guys. For example, when used as a verb:


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Orthodox 'fundamentalism' and obscenity

Apparently, a major religious obscenity trial in Moscow has been going on. I only know this thanks to a New York Times story, the Times being one of the few papers left these days that has the resources to do its own foreign coverage:


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