She did, however, provide, a few clues. In her opening statement, Kagan said that the court “has the responsibility of ensuring that our government never oversteps its proper bounds or violates the rights of individuals,” but “must also recognize the limits on itself and respect the choices made by the American people.” A justice, she said, must be a vigilant “trustee” of the “blessings of liberty,” but also “properly deferential to the decisions of the American people and their elected representatives.”

Among our most cherished “blessings of liberty” is the freedom of religion, our “first freedom.” In the words of James Madison, the “father of the Constitution,” America’s experiment in religious liberty has brought “lustre to our country.”

What, in Kagan’s view, is the role of the court in this experiment? When it comes to questions of religious liberty and church-state relations, does she think a justice should show vigilance or deference?

Read it all.

Seven pastors who work in the San Francisco Bay area and were barred from serving in the nation’s largest Lutheran group because of a policy that required gay clergy to be celibate are being welcomed into the denomination.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America will add six of the pastors to its clergy roster at a service at St. Mark’s Lutheran Church in San Francisco on Sunday. Another pastor who was expelled from the church, but was later reinstated, will participate in the service.

The group is among the first gay, bisexual or transgender Lutheran pastors to be reinstated or added to the rolls of the ELCA since the organization voted last year to lift the policy requiring celibacy.

Churches can now hire noncelibate gay clergy who are in committed relationships.

Read it all.

So far, history be damned. The contrast between revived profits and stunted job growth is stunning. From late 2007 to late 2009, payroll employment dropped nearly 8.4 million. Since then, the economy has recovered a scant 11 percent of those lost jobs. Companies are doing much better than workers; that defines today’s economy….

“Businesses can’t cost-cut their way to consistent profit growth,” argues Zandi. “Eventually, they need to generate revenue growth that requires investment and hiring.” There are some favorable signs. Companies seem to have stepped up replacement of aging computers; this could create jobs. General Electric says its 2009 research and development budget of $3.3 billion was up 18 percent since 2006, and it is supporting new products, from batteries to solar films.

But it’s unclear whether corporate elites were so traumatized by the crisis that they’ve adopted a bunker mentality. That, as much as uncertainty over Obama administration policies, could be fearsome. What might appeal to individual firms — paring expenses to maximize profits, hoarding cash to protect against a future financial crisis, waiting to hire until sales improve — could, if adopted by most companies, sabotage a stronger recovery. If labor is cowed and capital is overcautious, the economy must suffer.

Read the whole thing.

When Aauthor David Halberstam wrote his account of what got this nation into Vietnam, he didn’t find that the architects of the war were obtuse or illogical or commie-obsessed or infatuated with American might. Instead, in Halberstam’s now iconic term that became the title of his best-selling book, they were “the best and the brightest’’ ”” a superior governing class that was the product of America’s best families, its most prestigious prep schools and universities, and most august law firms and investment banks. The irony is that these geniuses turned out to be so dangerously wrong that the very term “best and the brightest’’ became a sarcastic euphemism for a hubris that leads to disaster.

One might have thought, then, that the “best and the brightest’’ would have been eternally discredited like the war they promulgated. But Barack Obama has such a strange, almost reverential faith in the very sorts of folks Halberstam flayed that the president threatens to lead his administration and the country down the same hubristic path….

Read it all.

The Vatican ran a £3.4 million deficit in 2009, [according to] the consolidated financial statements for the Holy See report.

The financial statements for the Vatican, which are independent of the financial statements of the Catholic Church’s various dioceses, religious orders and charitable entities, were presented to the 45th meeting of the Council of Cardinals for the Study of Organisational and Economic Problems of the Holy See.

A statement released after the close of the July 7-9 meeting, chaired by Vatican’s Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, reported that income in 2009 was €250,182,364 (£209,683,000) and expenditures were €254,284,520 (£213,120,000).

Read it all.

It is true that the confirmation of Canon Trisk increased the number of clergy currently on the Committee from one to two, which matched the number of clergy who had previously served. But the reason for the “shortfall” in that category was that one of those prior clergy members had in the meantime been elevated to the episcopate:

The Committee then heard that because Bp Catherine Roskam had ended her term as The Episcopal Church’s bishop representative at the last ACC meeting in Jamaica Bp Ian Douglas’s election by Executive Committee to that position following his consecration had been entirely within its constitutional powers. It did not constitute a fresh appointment and would not extend Bp Douglas’ period of service.

So Bishop Ian Douglas, a previously elected clergy member of the Committee, was replaced by Canon Trisk from South Africa, thereby keeping the clergy number at two. Isn’t that convenient?

Not really: by accepting the charade expressed in the seven words “because Bishop Roskam had ended her term . . .” the Committee also managed to maintain its episcopal members (not counting the five bishops appointed by the Primates’ Meeting) at three. But as explained in this earlier post, and this later one, there is no provision in either the old constitution and bylaws, nor in the new articles, for an elected member’s term to end before the start of the next ACC meeting, which happens in the spring of 2012.

Who told the “Standing Committee” that Bishop Roskam had “ended her term”? No one — because it is not up to Bishop Roskam to end her term, but to the body which appointed her: ECUSA itself (acting through its Executive Council).

Read it all.

Read it all and please note it also includes a section on the recent ACC Standing Committee meeting and related matters.

This assembly is today focusing on the gifts and needs of Asia ”“ which means, ironically, that the imagery of bread is less apt and immediate than that of rice. That in itself reminds us that so often we try to give to the other what they do not want or need, what is not familiar or nourishing. Sharing the bread of truth means also attending to the truth of the other’s actual condition. And much of what we European Christians ask forgiveness for is always going to be those moments in our history when we have offered a gift in a way that cannot be received ”“ perhaps because it is bound to alien cultural assumptions, or more seriously because it is associated with practices of oppression and exploitation. In the Body of Christ, sooner or later, we cannot avoid the moment when we make our peace by recognising that we need each other; that we must learn to open our hands for the rice that our Asian neighbour offers.

In contrast to what the secular culture sometime seems to think, this turning to one another in recognition of mistakes and hurts is not a futile indulgence in meaningless collective guilt or an attempt to settle scores. It is rather that we come to see how our history together has often made us less and not more human, and acknowledge that the effects of that are still powerful in our lives now. So we begin to ask one another for nourishment, including the not always easy or welcome nourishment that comes from hearing the truth.

One other crucial focus today is, of course, the act of reconciliation with Christians of the Mennonite/Anabaptist tradition. It is in relation to this tradition that all the ‘historic’ confessional churches have perhaps most to repent, given the commitment of the Mennonite communities to non-violence….

Read it all.

[P.D. James] James is, the profile shows, a thoroughly decent, thoughtful, and very charming person, the sort of person you’d welcome as a neighbor or even as a mentor or model. She’s a poster girl for the kind of urbane, skeptical, unflappable, worldly-wise Englishness beloved of Anglophiles. You can’t help but feel that the world is a better place for having P. D. James in it.

And yet part of that Englishness is a kind of religion whose appeal I don’t understand. It’s partly the agnosticism about the next world ”” I want a bit more definite knowledge than that in exchange for my Sunday mornings ”” but more the loss of the participation in the Divine life of which the promise of life eternal is a part.

Reading the profile after Mass today, it seemed to me that she gave up what is most entrancing about the Christian Faith….

Read it all.

O gracious God, we remember before thee this day thy servant and apostle James, first among the Twelve to suffer martyrdom for the Name of Jesus Christ; and we pray that thou wilt pour out upon the leaders of thy Church that spirit of self-denying service by which alone they may have true authority among thy people; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

When I am afraid, I put my trust in thee. In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust without a fear. What can flesh do to me?

–Psalm 56:3,4

More than 90,000 secret US military records have been leaked to the media, revealing hidden details of the war in Afghanistan, newspapers report.

The documents are said to include unreported killings of Afghan civilians as well as covert operations by US special forces against Taliban leaders.

UK daily The Guardian and the New York Times say the records were shown to them and to German weekly Der Spiegel by online whistle-blower Wikileaks.

Read it all.

BP Plc plans to appoint Robert Dudley to succeed Tony Hayward as chief executive officer as the board looks to recover the company’s position in the U.S., two people with knowledge of the matter said.

Dudley, the director of BP’s oil spill response unit, is ready to be announced as the company’s first American chief on July 27 and to take the helm Oct. 1, one of the people said, asking not to be identified because a final decision hasn’t yet been made. The decision was reached in discussions with board members about how best to take BP forward and rebuild its U.S. position, the person said. The BP board meets tomorrow to “rubber stamp” the plan, the second person said.

“The fact he is American should help to keep things a little more straightforward in his dealings with the U.S. administration,” Ted Harper, who helps manage $6.8 billion at Frost Investment Advisors in Houston, said today. He doesn’t hold BP stock. “Dudley’s most important task will continue to be making sure that the well is capped.”

Read it all.

The US government secretly advised Scottish ministers it would be “far preferable” to free the Lockerbie bomber than jail him in Libya.

Correspondence obtained by The Sunday Times reveals the Obama administration considered compassionate release more palatable than locking up Abdel Baset al-Megrahi in a Libyan prison.

The intervention, which has angered US relatives of those who died in the attack, was made by Richard LeBaron, deputy head of the US embassy in London, a week before Megrahi was freed in August last year on grounds that he had terminal cancer.

The document, acquired by a well-placed US source, threatens to undermine US President Barack Obama’s claim last week that all Americans were “surprised, disappointed and angry” to learn of Megrahi’s release.

Read it all.

You may find it here.

The search for dignity is work that all members of Christ’s body share. We’re invited to join the band of prophets, share the meal and drink the cup. It can be dangerous work, but most prophets I know are also filled with joy. Prophets generally decide that it’s not worth living in a system without dignity. Better to lose that life, and exchange it for one that builds up, because we lose our own dignity when we tolerate indignity for some.

The journey down to Antioch and back to Jerusalem led our ancestors to discover that one’s own dignity is mixed up with that of every other human being, and indeed all of creation. James made the same discovery. The work of the cross is the most life-giving journey we know. Are you ready, willing, and able?

Read it all (Word document).

Who are these robed in white, and where do they come from? They are the witnesses to the truth, and they have come through the great ordeal without capitulating to the comfortable lies of a society that urges them to relax, fit in, and enjoy the benefits distributed by Caesar.

From start to finish the Book of Revelation juxtaposes the truth of the gospel to the lies and illusions of powers that try to deceive the saints and lead them away from allegiance to the one true God of Israel who acted in Jesus Christ for the salvation””the soteria””of the world. The entire book calls us to discern the truth and to make a choice. So, in John’s vision, the martyrs in the heavenly throneroom are models for us. They diagnose our true condition by showing that the world serves false gods, and they offer us a model to be emulated: like them, we must worship only the one true God, and put our lives on the line for our testimony to him.

Wayne Meeks writes about the Book of Revelation, “The business of this writing is to stand things on their heads in the perceptions of its audience, to rob the established order of the most fundamental power of all: its sheer facticity. The moral strategy of the Apocalypse, therefore, is to destroy common sense as a guide for life.”

That is what the testimony of the saints does for us: to destroy common sense as a guide for life….

Read it all.

That theater, and improv in particular, can make a company or employee more competitive is not a particularly new idea. But what may be surprising is such training has not lost favor during the recession.

Ward has taught corporate and professional classes for 10 years. The recession has not been easy, but he points out: “I’m a for-profit arts organization that has kept the doors open through three of the worst years I’ve seen in my lifetime.”

Indeed, there appears to be enough demand to go around. Transactors Improv Co., also in Carrboro, has long offered what Greg Hohn calls applied improv classes. Hohn, Transactors’ executive and artistic director, also teaches the class at UNC’sKenan-Flagler Business School for MBA students.

Read it all.