I've just posted a podcast of an exceptional interview with Rev. Dr. James A. Forbes, Jr., former senior minister at The Riverside Church in New York and founder of the Healing of the Nations Foundation.

Amidst the swirl of controversy over Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright's comments and Barack Obama's disavowal of them, Easter services went forward at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago this past weekend. Rev. Dr. Forbes brought a message of healing at the evening Easter service at Trinity. According to the New York Times, Dr. Forbes preached about:

how the nation is in a "night season," a dark, destabilizing time, given the war, the economy and the vitriol over race and gender in the political primary. "It is nighttime in America," Dr. Forbes said, “and I want to bring a word of encouragement.”

Last winter, Dr. Forbes sat down with me to talk about healing the nation, a progressive view of truth, and the role of the Holy Spirit in the emerging progressive religious movement. I invite you to listen to the interview and be a part of this conversation by leaving a comment below about the interview.

About the Podcasts
This podcast is the second episode of Progressive Religious Voices, a bi-monthly podcast of interviews gleaned from nearly 100 interviews with progressive religious leaders. You can subscribe to the podcast feed directly or on iTunes to get all 24 exciting interviews that we will feature throughout 2008.

You can also read more about the growing progressive religious movement in my forthcoming book, Progressive & Religious: How Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and Buddhist Leaders are Moving Beyond the Culture Wars and Transforming American Public Life. The book is available for pre-order from Amazon.com and will be in bookstores nationwide in August 2008.

Labels: podcast, progressive christianity

This week, Wesley J. Smith posted a lengthy review of my book, Liberalism's Troubled Search for Equality: Religion and Cultural Bias in the Oregon Physician-Assisted Suicide Debates, in the conservative journal First Things. As a progressive, I don't see eye to eye with Smith on many issues (e.g., although I hate these labels, I often fall on the "pro-choice" side of many social issues like abortion). But we agree that legalized physician-assisted suicide (PAS) in the context of our current health care system--which leaves 48 million Americans without health insurance and many persons with disabilities without the care they need--puts vulnerable patients at risk. I'm grateful to Smith for the review, which reflects a careful reading of my argument.

I've included an excerpt here, with a link to the full article. Smith concludes the review by stating that "Jones’ logically argued and precisely aimed brief against assisted suicide from a liberal philosophical perspective—no call to respect the sanctity of human life here—is a distinct service to the broader debate."

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Liberalism’s Troubled Search for Equality

By Wesley J. Smith

Wednesday, March 5, 2008, 7:30 AM

In Liberalism’s Troubled Search for Equality, Robert P. Jones takes the measure of contemporary assisted-suicide advocacy through a distinctly liberal lens. He has impeccable credentials for this task: He is the director and senior fellow at the progressive think tank Center for American Values in Public Life, given birth by the progressive political-advocacy group People for the American Way. In fact, it is Jones’ fervent liberalism that leads him to declare boldly that legalized assisted suicide violates the principle of “egalitarian justice.”

This is an interesting, and one might even say daring conclusion, particularly given that it conflicts with mainstream thinking of the liberal establishment. This includes the views of liberal guru and philosopher Ronald Dworkin, who has long championed assisted suicide in books, articles, and amicus court briefs.

Jones deeply admires Dworkin, yet he doesn’t hesitate to hoist the philosopher on his own petard by demonstrating that assisted suicide violates Dworkin’s oft-stated principles of egalitarianism, which Jones laments stem from “peculiar inconsistencies within his theory.” Thus, Jones writes not out of animus but devotion to the cause, hoping that, by extricating assisted suicide from other progressive agenda items, he can help his movement take “a critical step on the path toward a more egalitarian liberalism.”

You can read the rest here.

You can buy the book here:

Labels: end of life, equality, health care, liberalism, physician-assisted suicide