Religion Dispatches
…to become better organized as a political force, even as they increase in number. The major impediment to that kind of organization is the fact that it is very difficult for secularists to conceive of themselves in tribal terms. Most tribes, whether of nations or ethnicities or sports fandom, can easily demarcate their membership—it’s the people who look like us, or talk like us, or dress like us. Tribes organized around religious belief have rit…
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…the Grateful Dead collectively formed an intentionally itinerant community numbering in the tens of thousands, with their own customs, vernacular, art, and economy. In his explanation of the lure of the Grateful Dead to thousands of Deadheads around the country, Garcia ruminated, “maybe we’re just one of the last adventures in America.” Indeed, the promise of a great American adventure animated Deadheads to undertake an annual pilgrimage across th…
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…n the street, violence would erupt. You had armed militia there, standing, with assault rifles—you know, the Three Percenters were there in their camouflage and assault rifles. What happened as you were standing at that intersection on Saturday afternoon? It was late-morning, early Saturday afternoon. Rev. Traci Blackmon and I were holding public witness. We had been in the streets, just speaking to people, to everyone. We were in full clergy gear…
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…Salman Rushdie has used the idea of children being disciplined by champal (flip-flops) to great comedic effect. Iranian films also use it for humor, because the truth is funny. It is relatively well-known that when you enter a Muslim house of prayer, you must remove your shoes. What may not be generally known is that it is customary when entering a Muslim’s home to remove your shoes. Unlike non-Muslims, Muslims consider steaming piles of dog feces…
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…n Chicago the river will be dyed green, and in Washington DC the Taoiseach will present the president with a Waterford Crystal filled with shamrocks. We’ll see kitschier associations as well, from “Kiss Me I’m Irish” t-shirts to full-grown adults cosplaying as leprechauns. Clergy have expressed concern about secular revelry obscuring the religious significance of what, after all, is a saint’s day. Fr. Ryan Jones, an Episcopal priest at the Euchari…
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…-image as misunderstood and persecuted. Thus they can discount Robertson’s flaws within frames like “the sincere leader with feet of clay” (who, like King David, models repentance and rehabilitation) or the “truth-teller quoted out of context” (who, like Christ, will triumph in the end.) Meanwhile, beyond an NCR subculture, sensational images of Robertson as a fringe figure—an extreme loose cannon—underplay continuities between him and relatively…
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