The post on circumcision certainly got a lot of attention! Google news has been sending me a lot of traffic, so I checked the query out and found this article which ended thus:
Ruth Katz, 38, of San Francisco had both her sons circumcised at brises. She and her husband, Michael Rapaport, were astonished when the teacher in their birthing class described circumcision as “immoral” and “not consensual.”
“The edict to have your son circumcised was the first covenant with God — the first challenge to being Jewish,” said Katz, pursuing a master’s degree in business administration. “I am a progressive person and think a lot about human rights issues, but I have never questioned this.”
Text can’t transmit intonation and tone. Is the lack of questioning a reflective utterance? Or is it defiant? Unlike some atheists I thank god that I don’t believe in god, because the way I live my life is always open to change, challenge and critique. The examined life is the fullest one in my book. Though custom, tradition and routine do scaffold one’s daily goings on, and to some extent serve to bind us to other humans, I believe it is important on principle to acknowledge that views are as provisional as our lives. I believe that those who sincerely believe in the divine do obtain a certainty in their values, but, I believe the flip side of that is when they must wrestle with the edicts of their god which violate their conscience. The Binding of Isaac is just the most extreme case.
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