A Hot New Start-Up, Peddling Penance

July 15 2015

Such is the premise of Ann Bauer’s novel Forgiveness 4 You. Grayson Carl writes in his review:

Throughout history, across faith traditions, I imagine the fantasy of a more “convenient” religion is universal. . . . Bauer’s satire, starring an ex-Catholic priest roped into launching a non-denominational forgiveness start-up, is distressingly credible on that point. “Key Insight,” a creative brief produced by one of her characters, reads and rings true: “Today’s busy professionals are seeking a faster, more service-oriented route to achieve spiritual peace than traditional religion or psychotherapy.” Uber, but for penance. . . .

Bauer’s novel is a way of wondering why we all, Catholic or not, so often fail to seek forgiveness. If even we notoriously guilty followers of the Pope won’t make an act of contrition, it’s hard to imagine the culture at large embracing the penitent instinct. “Great potential for growth in the Baby Boomer market,” one of the book’s memos reads, “but will require awareness campaigns to promote the concept of ‘guilt,’ which fifty-three-to-sixty-eight-year-old respondents to a survey reported they are ‘less likely’ or ‘unlikely’ to experience.” The trouble, Forgiveness 4 You intimates, isn’t that absolution isn’t “easy” enough; it’s that it rarely occurs to us to ask for any in the first place. We know not what we do.

Read more at First Things

More about: American Religion, Catholicism, Forgiveness, Literature, Religion & Holidays

Expand Gaza into Sinai

Feb. 11 2025

Calling the proposal to depopulate Gaza completely (if temporarily) “unworkable,” Peter Berkowitz makes the case for a similar, but more feasible, plan:

The United States along with Saudi Arabia and the UAE should persuade Egypt by means of generous financial inducements to open the sparsely populated ten-to-fifteen miles of Sinai adjacent to Gaza to Palestinians seeking a fresh start and better life. Egypt would not absorb Gazans and make them citizens but rather move Gaza’s border . . . westward into Sinai. Fences would be erected along the new border. The Israel Defense Force would maintain border security on the Gaza-extension side, Egyptian forces on the other. Egypt might lease the land to the Palestinians for 75 years.

The Sinai option does not involve forced transfer of civilian populations, which the international laws of war bar. As the United States, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and other partners build temporary dwellings and then apartment buildings and towns, they would provide bus service to the Gaza-extension. Palestinian families that choose to make the short trip would receive a key to a new residence and, say, $10,000.

The Sinai option is flawed. . . . Then again, all conventional options for rehabilitating and governing Gaza are terrible.

Read more at RealClear Politics

More about: Donald Trump, Egypt, Gaza Strip, Sinai Peninsula