Laura Larson writes at States of Formation about the business of making monsters: Through political rhetoric and sensationalized reporting, “monster” has been branded – on the cheap – into the American narrative and its everyday parlance. On Tebowing*: Dangerous territory"? Seriously? Let's start at the beginning. Whenever Tim Tebow takes a knee on the field and thanks God, he is engaging in a very conscious act of moral grandstanding. I write that with no judgment whatsoever. Tebow is saying, "Look at me," just as surely as Deion Sanders doing the pigeon wing in the end zone was saying, "Look at me." He is saying, "Look at me and gaze upon my prayerfulness," and he is saying that because he is an evangelical Christian, and evangelical Christianity is a religion built on conspicuous faith. He is bearing witness, right there on the hashmarks. He is spiking the Gospel. "Another Tibetan Nun Burns Herself to Death Over Repression of Religion" "Outlining how to get away with bullying," and calling it religious freedom. It's a worthy question:  How does the USCCB influence lawmakers when their opinions are so outside even mainline Catholic thinking? Bellah's Huge Project:  "Where did religion come from?" *h/t Nora Connor