Craig Ferguson seems to have a special liking for conversation with Stephen Fry.
Previously. On Wednesday night, Stephen was back on the Late Late Show as the only guest. The naturally wide-ranging discussion includes Arthur Conan Doyle, America, mortality, religion, philosophy, science, homosexuality, Wagner, and more.
Enjoy. [more inside]
posted by lazaruslong
on May 25, 2013 -
62 comments
If you fancy diversity in cheeses, you might have come across
queso Chihuahua, or Chihuahua cheese, a Mexican semi-soft cow milk cheese. But if you're in the Mexican state of Chihuahua, the cheese is called Queso Menonita or Campresino Menonita, for the Mennonites who first made the cheese in this region. The
Mennonites in Mexico are a small but growing socio-religious pocket of that has retained much of their traditional Dutch and German heritage, despite
a series of moves, from Russia to Canada, and finally Mexico. Mexican photographer
Eunice Adorno spent time with Mennonites in Durango,
capturing moments in their lives.
[more inside]
posted by filthy light thief
on May 16, 2013 -
18 comments
Alaska is home to two small villages of Russian Orthodox "Old Believers," whose ancestors left the church and their home in Siberia in 1666 in the face of state-issued church reforms. They have traveled more than 20,000 miles over five centuries in the search for the perfect place to protect their traditions from outside influences. Now,
assimilation into American culture is slowly overtaking them. (Via) [more inside]
posted by zarq
on May 5, 2013 -
49 comments
"Them and Them." "Rockland County, New York's East Ramapo school district is a taxpayer-funded system fighting financial insolvency. It is also bitterly divided between the mostly black and Hispanic children and families who use the schools and the Hasidic and ultra-Orthodox Jewish majority who run the Board of Education and send their children to private, religious schools." Also see:
A District Divided.
[more inside]
posted by zarq
on Apr 24, 2013 -
168 comments
The state of Washington has
filed suit against Arlene's Flowers, whose owner, Barronelle Stutzman, refused to provide flowers for the wedding of regular customers Robert Ingersoll and Curt Freed.
[more inside]
posted by roomthreeseventeen
on Apr 11, 2013 -
232 comments
Historically the United States (on a state by state basis) has given almost complete freedom to parents to name their children, both first name and surname, with results like "Fly-fornication," "Mahershalalhashbaz," "Encyclopedia Britannia," "States Rights" (who was killed in battle as an officer for the confederacy), "Trailing Arbutus Vines" and many more. (
Naming Baby: The Constitutional Dimensions of Parental Naming Rights, Carlton F.W. Larson, 2011 [
SSRN/
PDF]). In October 2012, however, New York courts made two interesting rulings that reflect limitations on renaming, if not naming, rights, for both adults and children.
[more inside]
posted by Salamandrous
on Feb 27, 2013 -
54 comments
Over a thousand monks and laymen are revered in Tibetan Buddhism as the incarnations of past teachers who convey enlightenment to their followers from one lifetime to the next. Some of the most respected are known by the honorific "rinpoche." For eight centuries, rinpoches were traditionally identified by other monks and then locked inside monasteries ringed by mountains, far from worldly distractions. Their reincarnation lineages were easily tracked across successive lives. Then the Chinese Red Army invaded Tibet in 1950 and drove the religion's adherents into exile. Now, the younger rinpoches of the Tibetan diaspora are being exposed to all of the twenty-first century’s dazzling temptations. So, even as Tibetan Buddhism is gaining more followers around the world, an increasing number of rinpoches are abandoning their monastic vows.
Reincarnation in Exile. [more inside]
posted by zarq
on Feb 5, 2013 -
16 comments
Hobby Lobby, a craft store with 525 U.S. locations,
has announced that it will defy a federal mandate to provide health coverage for all employees that includes emergency contraceptive coverage, and will pay a fine of $1.3 million every day.
[more inside]
posted by roomthreeseventeen
on Dec 28, 2012 -
389 comments
To say that Messiaen's Vingt Regards sur L'Enfant-Jesus (Twenty Contemplations on the Infant Jesus) is a masterpiece is a gross understatement. Over sixty years after its composition, it has rightfully earned the recognition of being one of the most important piano works of the 20th century. ... [It] is one of the most personal and intimate pieces Messiaen ever wrote, and it gives the listener a close look at Messiaen the person. Messiaen was a deeply religious person, and although his faith influenced every single piece he wrote, the Vingt Regards is almost like his own personal spiritual diary. -
Keith Kerchoff [more inside]
posted by Egg Shen
on Dec 13, 2012 -
16 comments
'Homeland,' Obama’s Show. The award winning TV show does little to alleviate the myths and misconceptions about Arabs and Muslims, writes
Joseph Massad, a
scholar at Columbia University. "The racist representation of Arabs is so exponential, even for American television [..] that one does not know where to begin."
[more inside]
posted by kiskar
on Dec 12, 2012 -
84 comments
Gay marriage: Religious 'opt-in' offered, but not to CofE - "The Church of England and Church in Wales will be banned in law from offering same-sex marriages, the government has announced.
Other religious organisations will be able to "opt in" to holding ceremonies, Culture Secretary Maria Miller said.
But she added that the Church of England and Church in Wales had "explicitly" stated strong opposition and would not be included."
Included in the legisation is "Amending the 2010 Equality Act to ensure no discrimination claim can be brought against religious organisations or individual ministers for refusing to marry a same-sex couple."
posted by marienbad
on Dec 11, 2012 -
70 comments
A woman wanting a mans-style hair-cut was
denied one by a Toronto barber because his religion forbids him from touching a woman he is not related to. The Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario is expected to hear the issue if
mediation fails, as a
competing rights issue where there is a conflict between two individuals exercising their rights. The
OBA (warning, cheesy music autoplay) defends some Barbershops as a men's-only space tradition dating back to Ancient Greece, while others point to womens-only spaces like
spas that are allowed to continue to operate while discriminating against men.
posted by saucysault
on Nov 15, 2012 -
239 comments
Heaven is Real: A Doctor's Experience of the Afterlife. As a neurosurgeon, I did not believe in the phenomenon of near-death experiences...In the fall of 2008, however, after seven days in a coma during which the human part of my brain, the neocortex, was inactivated, I experienced something so profound that it gave me a scientific reason to believe in consciousness after death.
posted by shivohum
on Oct 12, 2012 -
196 comments
