Brandon Hook

Editor's Note: Tweet @newshour to ask the candidates to #TalkPoverty in Wednesday's debate.

Marianne Williamson, a bestselling author and convener of the upcoming Sister Giant conference on women and politics, has called on President Obama and former Governor Mitt Romney to address “a meaningful array of topics” – including poverty, money in politics and incarceration rates in the U.S. – tonight during the first presidential debate. 

Williamson talked to us earlier today about these issues, which are particularly pressing for Christians who take Matthew 25 seriously.

The interview was edited for length and content.

Q: What are you doing to get these issues out there?

A: Having a voice and creating your own platform is not all that difficult with today’s technology. I think what’s happening now is that, firstly, people are realizing that. Secondly, people are realizing that there are certain things that need to be said that simply are not being said as loudly as other things being said. When it comes to a politics of conscience, why wouldn’t we expect that during the debates there would be a conversation about the 23.1 percent of America’s children living in poverty, or the 34 percent of poor children, or the 46 million Americans living in poverty?

It seems like the Bible is the one piece of real estate Donald Trump is unfamiliar with. Or maybe he’s just never read any of that “Jesus” stuff in the New Testament.

Last Monday, the Donald told Liberty University students not to turn the other cheek but to "get even" with adversaries, particularly in business.

"I always say don't let people take advantage — this goes for a country, too, by the way — don't let people take advantage,” Trump said. “Get even. And you know, if nothing else, others will see that and they're going to say, 'You know, I'm going to let Jim Smith or Sarah Malone, I'm going to let them alone because they're tough customers."

Most of us know what physics is, but what in the world is metaphysics? One might first recall Meta World Peace, who currently plays for the Lakers. So, metaphysics is just another one of those guys who adopted some sort of weird name, right? 

Wrong.

According to John Cobb, a theologian who played a crucial role in the development of process theology, metaphysics asks, "what is it in and of itself that constitutes what is truly real and actual"? In physics you don't quite get to that. Metaphysics deals with ousia, which is substance in Greek. The world is made up of substances and the questions of metaphysics are to understand what substances are.

Woah. That sounds intense.

You can hear more and hopefully understand a little more (via the "substance" of your brain) HERE, as Cobb talks theology during the Emergent Village Theological Conversation at Claremont School of Theology in California.  

As the radio emcee at Homebrewed Christianity describes it, "It's time to nerd out with your geek out."

“Are Mumford & Sons as big in America as they are here?” my English friend asked me a year ago over a pint at a pub on High Street in Oxford, England.

“Uh … yea,” I replied, astonished that their popularity was even in question. “They’re huge.”

Turns out that English friend is Marcus Mumford’s cousin, and he eventually got to see how big they are in the states, spending this past summer in Arizona and scurrying over to Colorado for their show at Red Rocks. (I know I’m jealous.)

But has that popularity and success translated into a decent sophomore album? Absolutely. One way to avoid the perilous “sophomore slump” that plagues many musicians and bands these days is to stick to your guns. And that’s exactly what English quartet Mumford & Sons did with their second album Babel.

 “The idea was always, ‘If it ain’t broke, why fix it?’” producer Markus Dravs told Rolling Stone.

And that’s almost exactly what audiences get on Babel. It’s as if Mumford took all the good things from their first record, Sigh No More, and channeled them into Babel.

Who blames ‘em? Their foot-stomping, banjo-plucking signature folk-rock sound has sent them to the far corners of the earth and back. It also shot Sigh No More up to platinum status, selling five million copies and nominating the band for two Grammys.

A cat runs for mayor and may or may not try out a new electric skateboard or a bike made out of cardboard. Some of the Pixar staff could've used some free coffee courtesy of GOOD when they studied for their graduate-level final exam in ichthyology for Finding Nemo. Oh, and the second trailer for The Hobbit came out too.

No matter how many times we see the little advert (as the English say) before the movie telling us to silence our phones, the temptation to go for our smartphones — to look up, for instance, the name of the other films that one actor (with the butt chin and beady eyes) was in before he became a superhero — is too much to resist.

Or maybe we just can't not text a friend to tell her how the ending of the Dark Knight legend picked up our expectations and pulled a Bane on them (i.e. broke their huge backs, shattering them entirely). 

Whatever the reason for putting down the bucket of popcorn and reaching for the squawk box, the fact remains: cell phones are a nuisance to everybody around us — in a cinema perhaps more than anywhere else.

Which is why a London movie theater recently started employing ninjas to combat rogue cell phone use during screenings.

Yes, ninjas.