Dishonor roll of American state Governors, November 2015

If you have studied the history of the Holocaust, you have probably heard of the voyage of the St. Louis, a ship carrying Jewish refugees from Nazi persecution. The St. Louis was turned away from Cuba and the United States, and eventually had to discharge its passengers in Belgium. The luckiest of the passengers were allowed to go to Great Britain. Of those who were returned to continental Europe, about half perished when Germany conquered Western Europe.

When we look back at this story, we are struck by the shameful behavior of officials who would turn refugees away. Today, a new generation of officials is about to go down in history for their shameful announcements that Syrian refugees from ISIS are not welcome in their states. They probably don't have the power to keep the refugees out, but I am happy to shame them just the same.

History, here are the names of the governors of the states who would refuse sanctuary to the Syrians:

Robert Bentley of Alabama
Doug Ducey of Arizona
Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas
Rick Scott of Florida
Nathan Deal of Georgia
Butch Otter of Idaho
Bruce Rauner of Illinois
Mike Pence of Indiana
Terry Branstad of Iowa
Sam Brownback of Kansas
Bobby Jindal of Louisiana
Paul LePage of Maine
Larry Hogan of Maryland
Charlie Baker of Massachusetts
Rick Snyder of Michigan
Phil Bryant of Mississippi
Pete Ricketts of Nebraska
Brian Sandoval of Nevada
Chris Christie of New Jersey
Pat McCrory of North Carolina
John Kasich of Ohio
Nikki Haley of South Carolina
Bill Haslam of Tennessee
Greg Abbott of Texas
Scott Walker of Wisconsin
Matt Mead of Wyoming

And a special shout out to David Bowers, Mayor of Roanoke, VA, who has cited the internment of the Japanese in World War II as a positive precedent for barring Syrians from refuge in the United States.

Sending your kids to church when you don't go...

Here's an interesting article about parents who, although they may not be churchgoers themselves, send their kids to church. It may seem puzzling that they would do that, but they have their reasons. Says Ruth Graham, the article's author, "I want [my daughter] to know the stories and songs that I love and to have a similar moral and cultural grounding that my husband and I were raised with."

Ruth seems to be a person who, like me, had a positive experience growing up in the church, but can't believe in all the church's teachings. According to the article, and the book the article is reviewing, non-religious parents still want their children to grow up with the love and protection they felt when they were young. There's also a sprinkling of guilt about depriving their children of their cultural heritage and of "spiritual resources."

What's not prominently addressed in the article is the idea that some parents must believe that religion is a foundation of morality that their kids can't get elsewhere.

I might have been one of these parents myself, but for an accident of history.

I grew up Protestant, the mother of my children Catholic. I have not been to a church other than for weddings or funerals since I was seventeen. My wife, a product of the Catholic Church as well as a Catholic education through high school, had also lapsed. She didn't want our children raised Catholic. I don't think the two of us ever discussed whether we wanted to take the kids to church, but we never did. I think perhaps that we knew the decision to take them to church might have led to tension over which church it would be.

In any case, our kids had the good luck never to go to church or Sunday School (although being babysat by their grandparents exposed them to more than enough religious belief). I had not yet consciously developed the idea that raising kids with religion is actually harmful, in that untangling just what is real and what is fantasy in this world is greatly complicated by a lifelong religious education.

I'm happy about the way things turned out, and any question about whether I should have raised my children otherwise has faded with the years.

Mormon control of the afterlife

So, the religion with the name too long to bother writing out is about to declare those in same-sex marriages apostates, and will take it out on their children. Those smart enough to realize that neither Mormons nor any other religion really know what happens after death, let alone being able to do anything that might change the outcome, are truly blessed.

Mormon threats to prevent the children of same-sex parents from a happy afterlife are merely their way of controlling their congregation's behavior in this life.