Being pro-life is horrifying. It confronts us with a reality more brutal than we like to think. If life begins at conception then we and our loved ones are capable of grave evil, and we find ourselves faced with the challenge of living in a violent world with gentleness, love, and forgiveness.
I understand the reaction that it just can’t be true. How could anyone live with that? This is how I feel about vegetarianism. The arguments are compelling, but if it’s true, l have to change my life. Not just my behavior, but my willingness to live in a world of mass injustice without resorting to violence to change it.
In many ways Mike is simply describing the problem of suffering. Suffering, after all, is a problem less for those who suffer than for those who have to watch helplessly when others do. Job did not find his suffering all that interesting—“in all this Job did not sin”—but his wife and friends sure did.
The point of the physical object 📿 isn’t to do it right (because there’s no such thing) but so your mind isn’t occupied trying to remember where you are or what you’ve said because you can’t mess up. Not like your prayer can fail and then God doesn’t get the message.
We don’t repeat the Hail Mary so the prayer “works” as if we skip one and she’s like nice try buddy but that didn’t take. We repeat it to exhaust any attempt to make prayer “work” because prayers don’t “work” in the way we think “work” means.
Trump made big gains with Muslims, jumping from 15% in 2016 to 35% in 2020.
One big reason is that compared to 4 years ago Republicans have been pretty quiet about Islam this year. It’s possible that the further we get from the War on Terror mindset the more Muslims may move back into the GOP, which they only fled in 2003.
No need to speculate though. Lots of Muslims on my FB page explaining why they voted Trump: facebook.com/82595329077918…
In my experience, conservatives can usually describe what liberals believe in a way that liberals would accept. Liberals, on the other hand, have absolutely no idea why anyone would be conservative besides being evil. This is why liberals exist in a state of chronic surprise.
The ability to make a positive case for your opponents is important for many reasons. The first is that you will never be able to persuade others unless you know what makes them tick. Calling Hispanics who voted for Trump self-loathing won’t cut it.
The second reason is more spiritual. People do not actually desire evil. Even the worst people desire the good but do so in a way that is misinformed or disordered. It’s always possible to describe their beliefs and goals in positive terms.