Friday Free-for-All: March 4

Time for some Friday morning links:

• France’s ban on the niqab, or face veil, goes into effect next month:

Face veils will be outlawed virtually anywhere outside women’s own homes, except when they are worshipping in a religious place or travelling as a passenger in a private car, although traffic police may stop them if they think they do not have a clear “field of vision” while driving. Women wearing niqab will be fined €150 (about £130) and be given a citizenship class to remind them of the republican values of secular France and gender equality. Any third party found to have coerced a woman into wearing the face covering, for example a husband or family member, risks a €30,000 fine and a year in prison.

• With Lent around the corner, a debate in the Catholic Herald: “Should Catholics give up more than beer and chocolate for Lent? Or are we being unrealistic – surely abstaining from one or two indulgences is better than nothing?”

 

• Surprised to see an argument about the Bible’s teaching on homosexuality in CNN, but Robert A. J. Gagnon ably dismantles the idea that “the Bible provides no clear witness” on the issue.

 

• “When Someone Is Wrong on the Internet”: Simcha Fisher on how to behave like a human being in cyberspace. “Have you heard yourself shriek, ‘Shut up, shut up, I’m defending Communion on the tongue!!!'” If so, it might be time to walk away.

 

• And you thought the Toyota accelerator pedal thing was bad: Mazda is recalling 50,000 vehicles because of poisonous spider infestations.

 

• The Inherent Ethical Issues of Isolationism, and other Dr. Seuss stories. Revised book covers in honor of the author’s 170th birthday.

 

• National Geographic on “the world’s most typical human.”

 

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4B2xOvKFFz4&feature=player_embedded 635×355]