My friend Eboo writes a piece for NPR on how to reach out to Jews during this most recent Eid al-Adha. I appreciate the sentiment, my daughter and his son are about the same age, and I think it is an important way to bridge the gap. Where I disagree is that this is an opportunity for inter-faith dialogue. In so far as religions share certain basic principles we can reach out, but the loss and horror of Mumbai is far more primal. His story highlights the more basic, human losses we share and support we need. It’s not about Muslim and Jew. It’s about right and wrong. It’s about love and hate. These things transcend religion.
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Hebrew Is the Focus of a Brooklyn Charter School – NYTimes.com
Hebrew Is the Focus of a Brooklyn Charter School – NYTimes.com. Every so often, Aalim Moody, 5, and his twin sister, Aalima, break into a kind of secret code, chatting in a language their father does not understand. Walking along Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn, they make out the lettering on kosher food shops and yeshiva buses, showing off all they learn at the Hebrew Language Academy Charter School in Midwood, where they both attend kindergarten. … Aalim and Aalima are not Jewish. They worship at a mosque affiliated with the Nation of Islam. But at the Hebrew Language Academy, they…
Not minimum, living
Father Jake has a good post on the failure of a Senate bill to increase the minimum wage. I love the FDR quote about the minimum wage and its implicit moral component. Riverstone picks up the idea and places it in the context of the teachings of Hazrat Isa. The two of them bring up an interesting point: If the people voting down this legislation are not interested in representing the will of the American people, nor in practicing the teachings of Hazrat Isa, are they the representatives of America? Christianity? If so, is this really what they stand for?…