Tag: ashley baxstrom

Legislating Holy Scripture in Ohio

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Ashley Baxstrom:  Ohio just keeps embarrassing the buckeye out of me (and that’s only on Jezebel). I can’t get a break. This week, however, it’s more of a middling sigh-and-shake-my-head feeling than an outright pounding in my temples.

The culprit? Anti-abortion demonstrators protesting at the state Capitol. What are they protesting? The fact that the Republican-controlled state Senate won’t consider a measure effectively banning all abortion once a fetal heartbeat can be detected.

No, you read that correctly. Republican-controlled. Won’t pass. Fetal heartbeat abortion ban. Continue Reading →

Put on your Sunday (Law)suit

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Ashley Baxstrom: In squint-at-the-screen-to-be-sure news, The Raw Story reports that a church in Oregon is suing a woman for posting negative reviews on Google.

Of course it’s more complicated than that. To review: Julie Anne Smith left the Beaverton Grace Bible Church a few years ago. She claims she and her family were shunned by church members at the direction of Pastor Chuck O’Neal. Smith responded by posting negative reviews of BGBC on Google and DEX. (A Google search for reviews found over 600, many of which have been posted since the article broke.) “We do it with restaurants and hotels and whatnot, and I thought, why not do it with this church?” Smith told KATU. Continue Reading →

America’s Buddhist Sister Act

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Ashley Baxstrom:  In case you missed it – we’ve already covered that Catholic nuns are having a hard time of it of late, what with the Pope calling them radical and all. But we just wanted to shine another spot of light into all that darkness. Good news under the general heading of “nuns”!

“General” because we’re not talking about Catholic nuns – sorry ladies – but Buddhist nuns, anyway! Continue Reading →

America's Buddhist Sister Act

Posted on by

Ashley Baxstrom:  In case you missed it – we’ve already covered that Catholic nuns are having a hard time of it of late, what with the Pope calling them radical and all. But we just wanted to shine another spot of light into all that darkness. Good news under the general heading of “nuns”!

“General” because we’re not talking about Catholic nuns – sorry ladies – but Buddhist nuns, anyway! Continue Reading →

His Holiness Gets Huffed

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Ashley Baxstrom: The Huffington Post announced on Friday that its very own Arianna Huffington – the Post’s namesake? Editor? Aggregator General? Blogger in Chief? – will interview the Dalai Lama on May 14th.

His Holiness will be awarded the prestigious Templeton prize, which “honors a living person who has made an exceptional contribution to affirming life’s spiritual dimension.” When he heard he would be receiving the award, he responded that he was just a simple Buddhist monk.

Huffington will sit down with him at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London the day of the award for a one-hour interview, and has asked the Post’s readers for topic suggestions. “If you had an hour with the Dalai Lama how would you use it?” the story asks. Continue Reading →