Jerusalem Post: Muslims, ultra-Orthodox, 'leftists' seen as giving least to Israel

Muslim Arabs, haredim and those on the political Left are seen as contributing the least to Israeli society, according to a new study on pluralism in Israel conducted for the Jewish People Policy Institute. [...]

Other findings of the study revealed that 60% of Israeli Jews believe there should be civil marriage in the country; some 44% would like non-Jews to attend their children’s schools; and 56% think the government should be more considerate of minority opinions.

However, 48% of those surveyed said there is too much freedom of expression in the country.

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Los Angeles Review of Books: How Aid Became Big Business

“The development and humanitarian aid business is there, it’s significant business, and we’re here to help you win some of that,” Peters grinned. A slide projected beside him bore the names of global aid agencies and development institutions like the World Bank and the UK’s Department of International Development (DfID). The men and women in the audience sat straight and still in their seats, focused on every word, moving only to take notes or get a closer look at the screen. “Welcome to the world of aid-funded business,” said Peters to applause. [...]

There has long been an “aid industry” — the swarm of for-profit companies and consultants that take cuts of government aid earmarked for the world’s poorest people. In some donor countries, aid has been officially “tied”: aid-funded contracts that are required to go to companies from the rich country that is “giving” this money. In the United States, the world’s largest official donor, “tying” aid has led to extreme cases of giant multinationals profiting off this protected business. Among the main beneficiaries of the multimillion dollar US food aid budget are the huge grain traders Cargill, ADM, and Bunge, who have won the lion’s share of the contracts to provide wheat and other commodities to be shipped from America to poor countries on US-flagged ships. (The shipping industry also benefits.)

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Worldcrunch: Catholics And Protestants, Doctrines Clash On Gay Marriage

After heavy debate in 1996, Germany's Evangelical Church, which encompasses most of the country's Protestants, declared itself in support of blessing homosexual couples, as long as there's a clear distinction with marriage. It went even further in 2013, when the first German homosexual couple was married during an Protestant wedding ceremony in Seligenstadt.

Last weekend, the leaders of the Evangelical Church in Berlin, Brandendburg and Schlesischen Oberlausitz decided to align the wedding ceremonies for homosexual and heterosexual couples, as the third national church in Germany. The justification: "The Bible knows the wealth of the formation of a relationship between two persons. It reflects the rich and God-given facets of sexuality in love."

The decision was approved by a large majority. Two days later, the synod of the evangelical church in Norway also decided that homosexual couples could marry. Even the Old Catholic Church in Germany, which separated from the Roman Catholic Church in 1870 after the dispute about the pope's infallibility, began allowing wedding ceremonies for homosexual couples in 2014.

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BBC4 Thinking Allowed: Migrant women, Wedding paradoxes

Migrant women in Britain: Laurie Taylor talks to Linda McDowell, Professor of Human Geography at the University of Oxford and author of a sweeping study of generations of immigrant working women in Britain. From textile mill workers in the 1940s to shopkeepers in the 50s, nannies of the 90s and software developers of today, these first and second generation migrants have been in the vanguard of a social revolution in women's contribution to the economy in the second half of the 20th century. In factories and hospitals, care homes and universities they've played a lasting role in British society, in spite of recurrent discrimination. But what do they have to say about their work and experience?

Also, Julia Carter, Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the Canterbury Christ Church University, considers the reasons why, in an era when weddings have never been more liberated from cultural norms and official control, couples still choose to follow the same assumed traditions.

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The Guardian: The nationalist identity crisis that could change Northern Ireland for ever

Yet even among conservative Catholics who do want a united Ireland, some have put their moral causes before the constitutional question. In East Derry last week, a group of conservative Catholics campaigned for the DUP as the party most likely to resist abortion reform and the legalisation of same-sex marriage. Last year the Catholic church also supported DUP efforts to introduce a conscience clause allowing tradespeople to discriminate against gay people.

This election has signalled a change in the old model of two mirror-image communities at odds with each other, equally committed to their separate sovereignty claims. In short, for many nationalists, there are some things more important to them than getting rid of the border. Yet it can probably be said with confidence that there are fewer in the unionist/Protestant community who are as blase about the Union.

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