TonioTimeDaily

"Compersion vs. jealousy.

Emotions do not exist on a hierarchy, meaning one is not “better” than the other. All emotions that we feel as humans are good and natural — it’s what we do with them that counts. Anger can be productive when managed effectively, and so can an emotion like jealousy. Our emotions are a roadmap to what’s important to us and what may need extra attention...

"Both went to their temples at the age of twelve, where they are said to have astonished all with their wisdom. Both supposedly fasted in solitude for a long time: Buddha for forty–seven days and Jesus for forty. Both wandered to a fig tree at the conclusion of their fasts. Both were about the same age when they began their public ministry:"

“When he [Buddha] went again to the garden he saw a monk who was calm, tranquil, self–possessed, serene, and dignified...

"Jesus devoted his life to speaking, helping, supporting, defending, empowering, healing, freeing, and loving everyone, especially saving those who were in desperate need from the hands of oppressors, rulers, officials, mobs, and those who intended to harm, kill, and destroy — because Jesus was a protester...

"It’s a vision that’s frighteningly close to the jihadist goal of enacting Sharia law.

If your starting point for the Christian faith is that members of other faiths have no rights and non-Christians are technically insane and that you have a God-given duty to control government, media and society-at-large, then yeah, anything less than that probably feels like “persecution...

"Did you hear about the pastor who was arrested for not marrying a same-sex couple? What about the publisher that got sued for refusing to censor anti-gay verses from the Bible?

Both of these stories have been exposed as fakes of course, but that didn’t keep hundreds of thousands of conservative Christians from sharing them online this week. When I pointed out to a friend that the story he had just shared on social media wasn’t true, he replied, “well it might as well be...

"ROME—“Marie” was placed in a French Catholic boarding school for “young girls from good families” when she was in the fifth grade. She remembers a nun who would come to her class every day to choose a student to help her with Mass. But the nun wasn’t looking for someone to help her. She was looking for a victim.

“I was 11 and looked 9. She would choose me once every two or three times,” she recalls. “She would take me to her office, lock the door, and then draw the curtains...

"Thompson: How do misconceptions play a role in the way we view sex work as work or not, and protecting the rights and lives of those in the industry?

Love: The stigma is that sex work isn’t a real job. People [don’t] really understand the amount of unpaid labor that sex workers do, or the fact that you are doing marketing and advertising and web development and photo editing and video editing and social media marketing...

"You may have heard references to “being sex-positive” or “the sex-positivity movement” in popular culture. Various celebrities have brought attention to this movement by speaking out about their beliefs and personal experiences regarding sexuality, sexual health, body positivity, “slut-shaming,” and sexual assault...

"So, what did we do? We had sex.

And we had fun.

No divine judgment, no personal judgment–it was a learning experience and certainly different than I expected. Having since gotten married, I can confidently say this: I have no regrets. Those things many of us grew up believing, that sex before a heterosexual marriage would hurt us in some way, hurt our partners, or reduce the meaning of marriage–it was all a lie...

"A spotlight is switched on whenever an abuse survivor steps forward to tell others how institutional leaders mishandled their sexual abuse disclosure. Spotlights that shine light into dark places are seldom welcomed by those responsible for the darkness. These spotlights come in many different forms and sizes. Some are media reports or articles, while others take the form of lawsuits and criminal cases...