Whether or not one agrees with Tweed’s definition of religion, his choice to begin his story in ancient Texas toward the end of the last Ice Age in North America, rather than New England or Jamestown in the 1600s, is the first of many refreshing narrative twists about who belongs in American religious history and what should count as religion.
New Future
I have hauled a lot of buckets of water across the street, trying to make up for the less than 1.5″ of rain in my rain gauge for all of August. For comparison, my town’s August average is 3.5″, and in the last two years my gauge has seen over 9″ — both prior Augusts following on July floods, whereas this year July barely hit average precipitation.
Impasse succeeds in its aim of candidly assessing our planetary predicament and offering a realistic, ethical way forward. Its achievement lies not in offering solutions—since Scranton persuasively argues that none exist—but in clarifying the nature of the bind we are in and offering a way to live meaningfully within it.
Drawing down carbon from the air and stashing it in underground rock formations has been framed as an essential way to slow and reverse global warming. But new research published Wednesday in the journal Nature finds there are far fewer suitable places to do this than previously thought.
At a Brooklyn town hall with Bernie Sanders on Saturday, Zohran Mamdani recounted how Bernie “gave me the language of democratic socialism to describe my politics” and called on supporters to keep organizing after Election Day. We reproduce his speech here.
Norway’s radical-left party, Rødt, has recruited thousands of members in recent years and looks set to boost its scores in Monday’s election. Seher Aydar MP told Jacobin about how it’s building on discontent with the established parties.
Our current system for elections to the House of Representatives systematically enables gerrymandering and helps trap the Left inside the Democratic Party. We need proportional representation.
In this week’s Frankly, Nate weighs the value of a pound of gold with other things that we derive worth from in our lives – from dollars and bitcoin to…less pecuniary markers.