For my wife, Peggy, and me, one of our favorite pastimes is to visit our local Barnes and Noble bookstore. We spend about 60 to 90 minutes perusing the multitude of books throughout the store. I often read and skim a new book to determine if I wish to purchase it. During a recent visit, I read through the new book by religious writer Elaine Pagels, the Harrington Spear Paine (Emeritus) Professor of Religion at Princeton University. She gives focus to practice and tradition, not necessarily specific theological doctrine or content. She has done extensive research into Gnosticism and its connection to Christianity. She has argued that “belief is overrated” and that is what is most important is what we practice. Perhaps her most important book is The Gnostic Gospels.

The eruption of antisemitism on the left—dressed up as opposition to Israel’s tactics in a war started by its enemies—is the most potent form of antisemitism in America. Wall Street Journal columnist, Gerard Baker writes, “Antisemitism has a strong pedigree on the left: The equation of capitalism’s evils with the supposed avarice of Jewish financiers is a popular theme, and to it has been added the modern ‘settler colonialist’ narrative that alleges Zionist rapine in Palestine.” Baker adds that “our universities are run by leaders who are models of the left-wing ideology that dominates so much of our politics and culture. It deems the rights of certain people less worthy of protection than others, it divides the world into oppressor and oppressed. You can call for the murder of all Jews, but say sex is biological and you will be punished . . . ‘Truth’ has been deposed and replaced with the monomaniacal ideology of the ‘My Truth’ crowd.”