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Archive: Janet Edwards
The right and wrong place for personal religious views
Personal religious views cannot and should not prevent a woman from having access to a legal, medical procedure. I trust that left, right, center, religious and secular all agree upon this fundamental principle of our constitution.
By Janet Edwards | March 3, 2011; 03:38 PM ET | Comments (5)
Freedom is a human idea -- Alleluia!
This may be the moment the USA steps fully into the 21st century, shedding the polarities of the Cold War and its child, the War on Terror.
By Janet Edwards | February 15, 2011; 03:10 PM ET | Comments (3)
Inspiration and pragmatism meet to build democracy
The inspiration may be religious but the policy that will prevail must always be pragmatic.
By Janet Edwards | February 1, 2011; 06:07 PM ET | Comments (3)
Incendiary political speech is aggressively selfish
Freedom of speech is one of the utterly essential pillars of government of, for and by the people. For me, the most serious moral implication of incendiary political speech is the way it exploits this necessary element of our body politic.
By Janet Edwards | January 11, 2011; 04:50 PM ET | Comments (0)
Loving your enemies
We may all share fear, but we also all share hope that it will get better and faith that the divine wills peace. History teaches us all: Peace never comes through violence. Love your neighbors, including your enemies.
By Janet Edwards | January 4, 2011; 03:06 PM ET | Comments (16)
Church could be a home for the holidays
As a mother, I yearn with my whole heart to give homeless LGBT youth a home. And as a Christian, my hope is that churches around the country would at the least be providing a spiritual home in their time of need.
By Janet Edwards | December 20, 2010; 02:09 PM ET | Comments (9)
Tax breaks for the wealthy violate the law and the prophets
Jesus summarized the law and the prophets in the equally simple but difficult commandments to love God and love our neighbor. Ending these tax cuts would do both, obeying God's law and loving those who come after us.
By Janet Edwards | December 14, 2010; 03:52 PM ET | Comments (36)
Marriage will decline until "we" overtakes "I"
It isn't marriage that's in decline in our country. It's community. As a pillar of our common life, marriage is eroding along with so many other aspects of community important to our American experience.
By Janet Edwards | December 8, 2010; 12:12 PM ET | Comments (9)
Grateful for God-inspired courage
Gratitude always engenders hope in me and so it does this Thanksgiving, 2010. May it do so as well for you.
By Janet Edwards | November 22, 2010; 04:07 PM ET | Comments (3)
We are losing good people who are eager to serve
The repeal of DADT is more than just allowing LGBT service members to serve openly. It's an opportunity for the entire military community to get to know some of their own as who they truly are.
By Janet Edwards | November 16, 2010; 02:40 PM ET | Comments (1)
Obama stuck between rock solid convictions and hard politics
President Barack Obama is stuck between the rock of his convictions on how to conduct himself as president and the hard place of how American politics are played.
By Janet Edwards | November 9, 2010; 03:08 PM ET | Comments (2)
My faith values Jon Stewart's sanity
I don't mind the Washington Coalition of Reason promoting "reason" because for me, there is no dichotomy between faith and reason.
By Janet Edwards | October 27, 2010; 11:58 AM ET | Comments (8)
Integrating who we love with our love for God
Some say that "religion is part of the problem," not the solution to acceptance of gays. I say it is both.
By Janet Edwards | October 14, 2010; 03:59 PM ET | Comments (0)
God has a plan and we do not know what it is
The problem with politicians taking on the mantle of God's plan is that politics is about the distribution of power. The moment that a candidate reaches to invoke God's power as their own, they have reached too far.
By Janet Edwards | October 5, 2010; 03:18 PM ET | Comments (3)
You cannot serve God and wealth
The Tea Party is not a religious movement even though it does have religious elements within it
By Janet Edwards | September 22, 2010; 10:08 AM ET | Comments (5)
Where the rubber hits the road for our Christian faith
So what should have been done? "Do to others as you would have them do to you," says Jesus in Luke 6:31. Fear has trumped love in our society in the years since 9/11 and what we can and need to do now is recommit ourselves to the hard work of loving our neighbor.
By Janet Edwards | September 7, 2010; 05:33 PM ET | Comments (2)
Morality, not religion, is what matters
I am blessed to claim President Barack Obama as my brother in the Christian Reformed faith. Because of this, when I hear that some are questioning and even claiming that President Obama is lying about his faith, I feel this on a very personal level. It feels as if my own faith is under attack.
By Janet Edwards | August 31, 2010; 05:53 PM ET | Comments (5)
"Christian" belongs to Christ
Can Anne Rice be spiritual without religion? Sure. When the church lost its purity under Rome, the ascetics went out into the desert to forge their relationships with God more or less alone. Jesus withdrew in order to pray. However, he did not stay there. And when the people of Jerusalem went astray, Jesus did not forsake the temple. He threw the moneychangers out.
By Janet Edwards | August 4, 2010; 02:09 PM ET | Comments (7)
Interfaith marriage strengthens American tolerance
For society, the most important thing is to support an interfaith couple -- just as we would any other couple -- as they make the promise to love and cherish one another. An interfaith marriage can only thrive in a society that values tolerance. And by the same token, the bonds of interfaith marriage strengthen the tolerant fabric of American life.
By Janet Edwards | July 27, 2010; 03:07 PM ET | Comments (3)
Loving (and leaving) our Afghan neighbor
whatever name it goes by -- loving your neighbor, or the Golden Rule -- the moral responsibility is the same. Reflect on how we would like other nations to treat us. And listen to what the Afghan people are saying. Love is our moral responsibility to Afghanistan. Loving means our military leaves.
By Janet Edwards | June 30, 2010; 01:58 PM ET | Comments (58)
God's creation, our responsibility
Whether animals have consciousness, souls, rights or sacrifice is irrelevant in the face of the fact that animals are God's good creation, which we are required to love as our neighbors. No expense of time or money is too great in caring for these completely innocent victims of human behavior.
By Janet Edwards | June 15, 2010; 03:23 PM ET | Comments (5)
Our complicity and responsibility
We may not work for BP, but we are all participants in an American society fueled by oil. And as the moral compass for so many millions of Americans, Christian tradition has much to answer for concerning the hubris that led to this so-far-unstoppable poisoning of an ocean.
By Janet Edwards | June 1, 2010; 04:26 PM ET | Comments (4)
Justices need not be Protestant to do their jobs well
As a Protestant, I am proud that our nation's Protestant founders gave us the gift of separation of Church and State. Thanks to their wisdom, for a Supreme Court nominee, just as for our elected representatives, the question of religion ought not to be a question at all
By Janet Edwards | May 11, 2010; 02:45 PM ET | Comments (1)
In their shoes
I can only imagine how I would feel as a Christian woman if I were told that I couldn't wear a necklace with a cross, or if, as a minister, I were forbidden to wear the clerical collar of my office. While I don't claim to speak for Muslim women, here is how I imagine I would feel if similar restrictions were put on my relationship with God:
By Janet Edwards | May 6, 2010; 12:47 PM ET | Comments (0)
God's covenant offers the model for how to love
To truly help young people navigate the world of sex, love and relationships in the 21st century, the Church must set aside its single-minded focus on purity and take up this central tenant of faith: God's love as a model for our own relationships.
By Janet Edwards | April 20, 2010; 10:47 PM ET | Comments (21)
Pope's opportunity to talk
To own his rightful place as the moral leader of the Catholic Church, the Pope needs to stop running away from this conversation and join the dialogue that will allow the Holy Spirit to heal the crisis in his church.
By Janet Edwards | April 6, 2010; 05:45 PM ET | Comments (2)
Afflicting the comfortable comes with the call
If seminary has done its job, the difference between the pastor and the sincere faith of his or her parishioners begins the first day. It is a dilemma every ordained minister faces. It is the duty of pastors to challenge the sincere beliefs of their parishioners and help our flocks to separate assumptions about "the way things have always been done" from the truly defining beliefs of our faith.
By Janet Edwards | March 17, 2010; 12:41 PM ET | Comments (3)
Who would Jesus not serve?
As Christians who strive to follow Jesus' example, we are called to minister to the weak and to rejoice when the longsuffering find relief -- including the stalwart LGBT couples who have waited so long to get married. We all know Jesus loved a good wedding feast.
By Janet Edwards | March 10, 2010; 11:46 AM ET | Comments (5)
The fine line between persuasion and manipulation
A current example of the problem with proselytizing is the situation in Uganda, where a bill is pending in the Parliament -- in part due to the activism and influence of American evangelicals -- to punish people convicted of homosexuality with death or, as a concession to international uproar, life imprisonment.
By Janet Edwards | March 2, 2010; 06:37 PM ET | Comments (25)
A matter of basic integrity, not religion
Since the days of our founding fathers, the United States has been committed to religious tolerance: a commitment that means we do not judge our fellow Americans based on our own religion. Keeping that promise is a matter of our nation's integrity, no matter what your religion.
By Janet Edwards | February 9, 2010; 05:05 PM ET | Comments (1)
Super Bowl a party, not a pulpit
My heart cries out for a meaningful conversation about these important matters of abortion and care for women and I trust Jim Daly when he says he feels the same way. I wish we could agree that Super Bowl ads are not the way to do it.
By Janet Edwards | February 2, 2010; 05:02 PM ET | Comments (7)
Spiritual leadership in politics: An indispensible ideal
Americans expect the president to be a spiritual leader as well as a political leader. There is a spiritual aspect to the American enterprise that has roots in the "city upon a hill" image of the Puritans on their ships, as well as later immigrants who set off for the unknown fueled by a hope for a better life.
By Janet Edwards | January 26, 2010; 07:38 PM ET | Comments (7)
