This issue of Common Ground explores some of the myriad ways in which religion intersects with government and politics in America’s pluralistic culture. And intersect it certainly does–for good and arguably for ill…
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Author Archives: Sheila
Ten commandments
I suppose it was only a matter of time until Indiana became embroiled in one of the more recent church-state controversies: the movement to post the Ten Commandments on the walls of courtrooms and government buildings throughout the country.
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Indiana, Bastian of Liberalism
It’s nice to be back in (comparatively) liberal Indiana. Yes, you read that right. Let me explain. For the last seventeen years, my husband and I have vacationed each July on a beach in South Carolina. The part of the state we visit is filled with tourists from elsewhere, so we rarely get a true taste of…
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Censorship and the Arts
I have this recurring fantasy: a caveman discovers that he can produce drawings of the animals he hunts on the walls of his cave. Excited by the possibilities of his art, energized by the creative act, he produces a drawing–only to have it rubbed angrily off the cave wall by someone in his tribe who declares that the depiction of animal…
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Power Versus Principle
Recently the Indiana Civil Liberties Union brought a suit challenging the constitutionality of Indiana’s property tax assessment formula. We did so because we believe it violates federal constitutional guarantees of equal protection as well as provisions of the Indiana Constitution.
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