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At Commonweal, John Gehring on Bishop Mark Seitz of El Paso, Texas, and other immigration advocates during their recent visit to Washington to argue for a comprehensive and humane immigration policy. When President Donald Trump invokes the need for "a wall," he has no idea how integrated these communities along the border have been. These advocates, including the bishop, are doing nothing more than defending their community from federal interference. That used to be a conservative value.
Sen. Bernie Sanders is taking his arguments to Trump country. I did not support the Vermont senator's bid for the Democratic nomination in 2016, and I continue to think the country is not ready for self-described socialist, still less one who honeymooned in Moscow before the collapse of communism. But Sanders has a winning message, and a hopeful one, to bring to those parts of the country that fell for Trump's fear-mongering and divisiveness. Politico has the story.
Is there anyone at Sacred Heart seminary in Detroit who likes Pope Francis? The latest entry in the anti-Francis crowd is Eduardo Echeverria, who penned a column in Catholic World Report attacking Pope Francis for failing to address the danger of antinomianism the same way he addresses the danger of legalism. What to say? In a blizzard, you worry about getting frostbite, not about getting a sunburn.
At Bloomberg, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, William Dudley, traveled to Puerto Rico last week and reached the important conclusion that the situation on the island remains dire and the uptick in construction they are experiencing now should not be misconstrued to suggest a return to a healthy economy.
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From the Under-Told Stories Project at the University of St. Thomas, a look at how some Kenyan villages are beginning to install small solar panels that provide a modicum of electricity to very poor homes. This is the kind of project the people in Puerto Rico need.
At the Working-Class Perspectives blog, Ken Estey on the ties between evangelicalism and organized labor. The late Rev. Billy Graham may not have been hostile to labor, but his desire not to choose between labor and capital proves the value and superiority of Catholic anthropology, which always has and always will value labor above capital.
This video shows Archbishop Joseph Naumann, incoming chair of the Pro-Life Activities committee at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops talk in a way that sounds an awful lot like he is a consistent ethic-of-life guy. Immigrants? The poor? Will the archbishop soon be targeted by LifeSiteNews?
[Michael Sean Winters covers the nexus of religion and politics for NCR.]
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