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Max Kuzma

@maxwellkuzma.bsky.social
753 followers 292 following 1.4K posts

Transgender man, lifelong Catholic, NCR Columnist, Board Member DignityUSA, Host of Whiplash Podcast Subscribe to my newsletter here: www.maxwellkuzma.substack.com/

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Reposted by Max Kuzma
dan sinker @dansinker.com · 14h
You'd think that the Democratic party would be making hay over their opposition's biggest donor fighting to let his bot keep making revenge porn.
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Pop Base @popbase.tv · 12h
An Arizona man that fatally shot another male in a road-rage incident will be resentenced after an AI-generated video of the victim forgiving him was improperly used during sentencing. The initial judge said he felt that the AI-generated depiction of the victim portrayed “genuine forgiveness.”
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Rich Raho @richraho.bsky.social · 10h
Cardinal Cupich: “For Chrysostom, the altar inside the church and the ‘altar’ of the marginalized person on the street were two aspects of the exact same reality. To bow before the consecrated Host while being indifferent to the stranger is a fundamental breakdown of eucharistic logic.”
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 9h
"Art, when it is authentic, is animated by restlessness. Art is an essential place of listening, where we allow ourselves to learn about the aspirations and wounds of humanity, its thirst for beauty, for justice and peace, and its search for meaning." - Pop Leo XIV
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 12h
Today on my Substack, a review of Sara Bareilles's new album "Good Grief," with a bit of a reflection of redemptive suffering: maxwellkuzma.substack.com/p/sara-barei...
maxwellkuzma.substack.com
Sara Bareilles and The Art of Grief
“What goes too long unchanged destroys itself.
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Mike Hixenbaugh @mikehixenbaugh.com · 02/10/2026
Scoop: At a secret meeting this summer, an aide to Stephen Miller laid out Trump administration's plan to make it easier for states to round up and institutionalize mentally ill homeless people — by pushing a drastic policy change that would weaken the rights of millions of disabled Americans.
nbcnews.com
How Trump’s homelessness crackdown became a sweeping retreat from disability rights
After issuing a memo making it easier to institutionalize homeless people, the Justice Department began abandoning cases protecting disabled people’s right to live in the community.
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Dean Dettloff @deandettloff.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Great piece interviewing legendary liberation theologian Frei Betto on the election in Brazil. www.theguardian.com/world/2026/s...
theguardian.com
‘Viscerally dedicated to social issues’: behind Lula’s drive to win final term in Brazil’s crunch election
Longtime friend tells of president’s obsession with social justice and fears for country’s future under another Bolsonaro presidency
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𝐊𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐧 𝐎'𝐇𝐢𝐠𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐬, 𝐒.𝐉. @kohsj.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
It’s so upsetting that this is what gets elevated in American Catholic spaces.
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
We're actually already seeing this realization on anti-trans messaging from Third Way assignedmedia.org/breaking-new...
assignedmedia.org
Democrats Lose by Punching Down on Trans Issues, Strategists Say - Assigned Media
Insiders, including at centrist think tank Third Way, are cautioning Democratic candidates against echoing Republican talking points on trans rights.
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Maggie Astor @maggieastor.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
The 988 suicide prevention hotline's Press 3 option — which provides specialized services to LGBTQ callers — has been restored more than a year after the Trump administration shut it down. Confirmed by HHS and the office of Senator Tammy Baldwin, who led on legislation that forced its restoration
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Charlie Warzel @cwarzel.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
There is a moment at the very very end of Abdul El-Sayed's podcast with Ezra Klein (book recommendation section) where he talks about the idea of "speaking truth to pain" and this will be staying with me for an extremely long time. www.nytimes.com/2026/09/25/o...
But there’s also something about truth to pain. We talk a lot about truth to power, but I think it’s actually a lot harder to speak truth to pain. I say that as someone who went to medical school, realizing that in a lot of our politics right now, we’ve got to get a lot better at speaking truth to pain if we’re going to get through some of these challenges that we have.

What does “truth to pain” mean?

It’s one thing to look power in the eye and say: You’re wrong about this. But there’s a way in which pain is very difficult to reason with. Because when somebody is in their pain, they’re in their trauma. They see that pain, and they may not see what’s causing it.

I remember just very explicitly being in a trauma ward with a gunshot wound patient and watching this big guy with his hand on his gunshot wound. All the folks are trying to pull his hand off his pain, that point of his gunshot wound, this clear vulnerability.

And this emergency room doctor had the presence of mind to be like: Everyone, stop. And she looks him in the eyes, and she’s like: I get that really hurts, and I’m so sorry that you’re here. You don’t want to be here. We don’t want you to be here. But if you don’t let us fix this, you could die. So I’m going to take your hand, and I’m going to move it off, OK? Because I need to get there so that you can live.

She was speaking truth to pain. He understands he’s at the hospital, he needs care, but he also doesn’t want anybody to touch the wound. Which is a natural thing. And I think it is a really great metaphor for how we think about a lot of these challenges we talked about today.
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
🤦🏻‍♂️ transphobia continuing to be totally logical 🙄 might be easier to just, you know, treat us as people
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
AI this, AI that, why doesn't Adobe Photoshop have a spellcheck
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
40 years ago this October, the Vatican released the document that became known as the “Halloween Letter.” Written by then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the 1986 letter described homosexuality as an “objective disorder” and same-sex sexual activity as “intrinsically disordered.”
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Katelyn Burns @katelynburns.com · 30/09/2026
I actually don't think the Republican Senator mixed up "Hawks" and "Hawkeyes." Going by his own statements, it appears his staff saw he went to a basketball game on that date and googled basketball games and found the only men's game that night in the whole country was in Atlanta.
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Gay Catholic Priests @gay-cath-priests.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Vatican’s anti-gay 'Halloween Letter' to be examined 40 years later www.ebar.com/story/170732...
ebar.com
Vatican’s anti-gay 'Halloween Letter' to be examined 40 years later
LGBTQ Catholics will have an opportunity to revisit one of the darker days in their fraught relationship with the church as an affinity group holds online sessions timed with the 40th anniversary of w...
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NPR @npr.org · 30/09/2026
The Trump administration has taken government equity stakes in more than three dozen private companies. n.pr/46UKiy3
n.pr
How Trump keeps undercutting his anti-communist message
The Trump administration has taken government equity stakes in more than three dozen private companies.
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Dean Dettloff @deandettloff.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
The Brazilian Conference of Catholic Bishops, which has been outspoken against far-right tendencies in Brazil, also had their X account restricted. paydayreport.com/x-blocks-acc...
paydayreport.com
X Blocks Account of National Conference of Bishops of Brasil As Catholics Back Lula
Polls show Catholics backing Lula as the church denounces foreign interference.
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Christopher Hale @christopherjhale.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Asked aboard the papal plane Monday about Germany’s far right, Pope Leo XIV said its fusion with “a certain kind of religion” is “not an authentic expression of Christianity.” The values of the Gospel, he said, “are not about hatred and division.”
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
This honestly doesn't surprise me. And wouldn't be surprised if Data Centers see similar discrepancies between funding/ revenue
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Imani Gandy @angryblacklady.blacksky.app · 28/09/2026
The trans women in sports panic has got to be one of the GOP's most successful manufactured culture war campaigns. Somehow they got a lot of people who would otherwise say they support trans rights to somehow fear "fairness" in sports. It's a non-issue.
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Br. Dr. Ken Homan, SJ @kenhomansj.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
It's astounding how much of Catholic social media is:
Principal Skinner: Is loving immigrants part of my moral duty? 

No, it's the Pope who is wrong!
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Kevin Clarke @clarkeatamerica.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Cardinal Robert McElroy issued another sharp denouncement of Trump administration immigration enforcement and deportation policies, adding to the growing collection of such pronouncements from U.S. church leaders around the country in recent months. www.americamagazine.org/politics-soc...
americamagazine.org
At Mass for Migrants, Washington’s Cardinal McElroy says public cannot ‘pass by’ plight of immigrants
“For the last year and a half,” Cardinal McElroy said, “the people of the United States have witnessed the suffering of the undocumented in our midst, purposely and strategically magnified by our gove...
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Dean Dettloff @deandettloff.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Guys do not tell these researchers about tomagachis
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The Japan Times @japantimes.co.jp · 26/09/2026
One of eight such craftsmen left in Japan, Yoshinori Shimatani never drinks or has a contentious conversation before he tunes a Buddhist bell: "Frustration ruins the sound. You have to find peace within yourself first."
ebx.sh
To craft a Buddhist bell, ‘you have to find peace within yourself first’
Yoshinori Shimatani, a fourth-generation “orin” (standing bell) master craftsman, views his process as equal parts physical and spiritual.
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🌬Breeze @cool-summer-breeze.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
This is the Stolen Neighbors Quilt. Each of the 11,000 squares represents a person taken by ICE in Minnesota.
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Paris Marx @parismarx.com · 24/09/2026
Just when I think I can’t hate OpenAI and Sam Altman any more, new details come out about how ChatGPT helped a shooter plan one of the worst mass shootings in Canadian history in Tumbler Ridge, BC. OpenAI made an explicit decision not to report the user to authorities.
motherjones.com
ChatGPT helped the Tumbler Ridge school shooter focus on guns, tactics, and terror, our investigation reveals
OpenAI’s chatbot fed the shooter’s violent fantasies and planning up to the massacre.
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Crockpot season
beef stew in a crockpot
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
What is the "Video killed the radio star" of the internet era?
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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 21/09/2026
i mean, just look at how the populists talked about the railroad barons and others like them. "The fruits of the toil of millions are boldly stolen to build up colossal fortunes, unprecedented in the history of the world, while their possessors despise the republic and endanger liberty."
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Ryan Boyd @ryanboyd.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
NEW BRAIN DROPPED
med.stanford.edu
Human brain is two separate organs, Stanford Medicine-led research finds
Stanford Health Care delivers the highest levels of care and compassion. SHC treats cancer, heart disease, brain disorders, primary care issues, and many more.
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Andrew Quemere @andrewqmr.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
A couple went on a Fox News podcast and claimed the state of #Massachusetts took away their teen because they won't help the teen transition. But it's actually because the father was charged with beating and threatening to kill the teen and the mother was charged with witness intimidation.
wbur.org
Mass. parents' story about child's gender transition complicated by court records
Joseph Kutzko was charged with assaulting the child in January 2025, not long before the child was removed from the family’s home. Mother Arlene Kutzko was charged with witness intimidation in connect...
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
New on the podcast today substack.com/@maxwellkuzm...
substack.com
Telling LGBTQ Stories with Prism United
Dear Listeners,
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Really good www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3w-...
youtube.com
Smart Answers to Smart Questions About Slavery
YouTube video by Takes™ by Jamelle Bouie
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Lee Hurley
@HLeeHurley

I just want people, who know nothing about trans people, to stop getting all their information about trans people from people who hate trans people.
That's it.
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Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 18/09/2026
it's funny but also a reminder that the fundamental premise here is that a Black man can't be objective when talking about race while a white man can because Black people do identity politics and white people do facts and this my friends is what I have named "white empiricism"
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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 18/09/2026
lmao
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Timnit Gebru @timnitgebru.blacksky.app · 16/09/2026
Folks, remember when Geoff Hinton called gpt-2 humanity's caterpillar and gpt-3 humanity's butterfly or something like that? Also remember how he said radiologists were gonna be obsolete in 5 years (but he said that ~10 years ago)? Ok now, he says ChatGPT is an alien being.
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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 16/09/2026
yes. i would wager that these people genuinely believe that the country is MAGA and that there is a vast and untapped audience to be appealed to. incidentally, these people also exist in an impenetrable bubble of sycophants.
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derek guy @dieworkwear.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
When they eventually make a movie about this time, please don't put the male politicians in good suits. IMO, the ugly, low rent tailoring should be part of the story.
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Sojourners @sojo.net · 12/09/2026
The Vatican will build a roughly $117 million renewable energy plant that could power the Holy See within two years. sojo.net/articles/new...
sojo.net
Vatican Planning $117 Million Pivot to Renewable Energy
The renewable energy plant that could power the Holy See within two years via a system combining solar power and agriculture, sources involved in discussions on the project said.
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tomwellborn3rd @wellborn.net · 08/09/2026
Tarrant County cut 92 polling places in a county that is 60 percent nonwhite, and the coverage will be a human interest piece about a patient voter in a folding chair. Long lines are not a turnout story. They are a budget decision someone made on purpose.
hartmannreport.com
Has the Media Normalized the GOP’s Voter Suppression Right Before Our Very Eyes?
For decades, reporters have treated hours-long voting lines as a “normal” feature of Election Day instead of investigating why some Americans consistently face greater barriers to the ballot…
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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 07/09/2026
worth tying this into the political economy of the slave south as well. from roughly the 1820s onwards, slavery became enormously lucrative in ways that had never been seen before. slave traders became millionaires. large planters had tremendous purchasing power. just huge amounts of wealth.
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Michael Hobbes @michaelhobbes.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
Yep! The anti-vaxx/MAHA movement is very clearly a product of a right-wing media environment. A 2022 survey found Fox News viewers were 4x more likely to hold anti-vaxx views than non-Fox viewers, by far the best predictor. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...
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Max Kuzma @maxwellkuzma.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
Empathy has become the latest battleground in the culture war. Bishop Robert Barron has now joined the fight—but what does Catholic Social Teaching actually say about empathy, human dignity, and the responsibility to listen? maxwellkuzma.substack.com/p/empathy-is...
maxwellkuzma.substack.com
Empathy Is Not the Enemy of Love
Empathy has become a battleground in the culture wars.
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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 06/09/2026
the reason i keep arguing against “the vibe shift” being a real thing is that quite a few commentators believe otherwise and it has left them completely unable to analyze, understand and respond to the current political moment
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4fuxake @blueheartedly1.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
School meals should be free for everybody. Charging children to eat somewhere they are legally required to be for the entire day is crazy.
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NPR @npr.org · 04/09/2026
The global effort to end child marriage is in the news. In the U.S., there's a new bill before Congress (but it's controversial). And the U.N. is designating a day dedicated to ending the practice. n.pr/4yoJoFV
n.pr
Whatever happened to the U.S. campaign to ban child marriage?
The global effort to end child marriage is in the news. In the U.S., there's a new bill before Congress (but it's controversial). And the U.N. is designating a day dedicated to ending the practice.
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Cody⁺ @cebmplus.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
The Roman Catholic archbishop of Indianapolis has dispensed the Sunday mass obligation for those afraid of detention or intimidation by ICE. What a profoundly messed up world we live in! 🕯️
A letter on official letterhead 

CHRIST THE CORNERSTONE
GENERAL DECREE
Dispensation from the Obligation to Participate in Mass
On Sundays and Holy Days of Obligation
Whereas recent days have seen an increase in immigration enforcement in the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, causing a significant rise in fear and anxiety amongst our immigrant communities, and
Whereas the Christian faithful have an obligation to participate in Mass on Sundays and Holy Days of Obligation (c. 1246§1, 1247), and the fear and anxiety caused by the recent immigration enforcement activity may deter some of the Christian faithful from fulfilling their obligation to attend Mass, which would be detrimental to their spiritual welfare, and
Whereas the Archdiocesan bishop is able to dispense the faithful from disciplinary laws, both universal and particular, when it contributes to their spiritual welfare (c. 87 §1).
I hereby dispense from the obligation to participate in Mass on Sundays and Holy Days of Obligation all those persons living within the Archdiocese of Indianapolis who reasonably fear being detained, separated from their families, or experience intimidation due to the increased immigration enforcement. This applies even to those with proper legal documentation.
This dispensation will last through September 30th, 2026, unless further extended by decree.
The Christian faithful who discern they must make use of this dispensation are encouraged to supplement spiritual practices on Sunday and Holy Days of Obligation with practices such as praying with the Sunday readings of the Lectionary, praying the rosary or other sacramentals, and/or watching a livestreamed Mass on television or the internet.
Pastors and all those who minister to the faithful within the Archdiocese of Indianapolis are encouraged to attend to the spiritual care of those who must make use of this dispensation to the best of their ability, especially regarding the Sacraments Penance and Anointing of the Sick, or the distribu…
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