The Dish

This letter to the Washington Post speaks to a lot of American Catholics, I think:

The truth is, despite my issues with the Church, I most likely will raise my children Catholic. I may not believe everything the Church believes and may even actively oppose some of its positions. But as time has passed, I’ve come to see that, for me, Catholic isn’t so much my faith but my culture. It’s who I am.

It’s 13 years of Catholic schooling. It’s praying the rosary while crouched down in the hallway, hands over head, tornado sirens blaring. It’s the Ursuline Sisters, with their quick laughs, steady guidance and humble intelligence, who acted as teachers, mentors and friends. It’s ashes on my forehead on the first day of Lent, midnight Mass on Christmas Eve, Stations of the Cross, summer church picnics, "The Lives of the Saints," fish on Fridays and "Ave Maria." It’s so many pieces of me that I would not be who I am if I took any of them away.

My Catholicism is for me, in many ways, like home – not always what I want it to be, yet often exactly what it needs to be. It is where I come from and where I belong. For my children to know me, they must know the Catholic Church.

I should say I don’t believe in merely cultural Catholicism. But I don’t think this woman has stopped being a Christian, a believer in the resurrection, and the message of the Gospels. She is merely struggling to keep her faith despite the often maddening flaws of a human church. But the message is strong enough to outlive the flaws. And it will.

David Horowitz responds to my recent criticism of his limited defense of Mel Gibson:

To describe me as someone who operates on the principle of "no enemies to the right" is very unfair. I took on the entire leadership of the Christian Right, writing three widely quoted articles on the subject, when they attacked Marc Racicot for meeting with the Human Rights Campaign, I have whacked Falwell, Bauer, Lott, Armey and Weyrich by name for anti-gay positions and comments, I have stated that Intelligent Design is not a scientific theory and has no place in the academic curriculum, I have opposed a Republican bill in Arizona that would force teachers to assign different books to students who were offended by those they assigned first, I defended Ward Churchill’s right to publish reprehensible stuff on the Internet and not be fired and then criticized the Republican governor of Colorado (who happens to be a personal friend) for demanding that Churchill be fired – and I did this in an op-ed in the Denver Rocky Mountain News at the height of affair. My magazine, Frontpage, has slammed Pat Buchanan, Lew Rockwell and the paleo-right time after time over the war and in exactly the same terms we have employed when dealing with the Counter-punch left.

The most anti-gay state in the union, if you analyze its legislative history, is now beginning to see gay flight. May they take their disposable income, their skills, their jobs, their companies and their self-respect with them. This is the state that has enacted the full Christianist agenda on gay couples: denying them not just marriage and civil unions, but even legally binding private contracts to help them support their relationships. The situation is particularly rough for gay couples with children:

In 2002, for example, an Alexandria family court ruled that a father would lose custody of his son unless the father’s male partner, who had lived with them for five years, moved out. In 2004, a Winchester judge ruled that the female partner of a woman who had borne a child in 2004, whom the child had called "mama," had no legal custody rights and that the woman who gave birth was the "sole parent."

If majorities want to persecute minorities, and the courts won’t stop them, people have few options but to leave. That’s what many African Americans did when their interracial marriages and families were ruled null and void ‚Äî in the same state only forty years ago. It’s sad to see this pattern repeated. But if Virginians want their state to be Homorein, there’s no reason gays should stay.

Borat learns football.

A reader writes:

I am not a political conservative, but I am a passionate environmentalist, and your article startled me into the realization that the source of my own environmental commitment is essentially conservative: a love for the natural world as we have received it and an intense determination that it not be lost forever. I am certain that I am not alone, and your insight is likely to alert other liberals/progressives to an unsuspected wellspring of conservatism within themselves. Is it possible that there are far more true conservatives among us than we have been able to acknowledge?

Better yet, you’ve made the case that conservatives have at least a good a claim on ‚Äî and obligation to ‚Äî policies to protect the environment as those on the left. Case closed, I think ‚Äî and in ten years, let us hope, people will marvel that it was ever open in the first place. The goal of environmental protection is fundamentally beyond politics, uniting those all across the political spectrum. We should go from disputing this to a lively debate about means: conservative vs. progressive, private initiatives vs. government actions, incentives to industry vs. regulatory requirements. Let the debate begin, and let no possible solution ‚Äî including, absolutely, no conservative solution ‚Äî go unexplored or unadvocated. And if the conservative solutions prove to be more effective than those espoused by the left, what a victory for the planet ‚Äî and for conservatism ‚Äî that would be!

So to conservatives who share your insight, I say: you have no idea how much we environmentalists of other persuasions have needed you, missed you, and been baffled by your absence. Welcome home.

Crowley thinks the latest polls ‚Äî more bullish on Joe ‚Äî are significant. Beinart makes the case. Classic Marty kvetch here. It’s almost like being back in the office.

Good news for her — and the blogosphere.

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Boone, North Carolina, noon.

Here’s a full translation of Norwegian writer Jostein Gaarder’s call for the obliteration of the state of Israel in the leading Norwegian newspaper, Aftenposten. Gaarder is an establishment literary figure in Europe. His anti-Semitism is far more widely held than most understand. Another money-quote:

There is no turning back. It is time to learn a new lesson: We do no longer recognize the state of Israel. We could not recognize the South African apartheid regime, nor did we recognize the Afghan Taliban regime. Then there were many who did not recognize Saddam Hussein’s Iraq or the Serbs’ ethnic cleansing. We must now get used to the idea: The state of Israel in its current form is history.

We do not believe in the notion of God’s chosen people. We laugh at this people’s fancies and weep at its misdeeds. To act as God’s chosen people is not only stupid and arrogant, but a crime against humanity. We call it racism…

We acknowledge and pay heed to Europe’s deep responsibility for the plight of the Jews, for the disgraceful harassment, the pogroms, and the Holocaust. It was historically and morally necessary for Jews to get their own home. However, the state of Israel, with its unscrupulous art of war and its disgusting weapons, has massacred its own legitimacy. It has systematically flaunted International Law, international conventions, and countless UN resolutions, and it can no longer expect protection from same. It has carpet bombed the recognition of the world. But fear not! The time of trouble shall soon be over. The state of Israel has seen its Soweto.

We are now at the watershed. There is no turning back. The state of Israel has raped the recognition of the world and shall have no peace until it lays down its arms.

Surrender, Jews. I have a feeling they have heard those words before and know what they presage.