Religion Dispatches
…e eighteenth century to the turn of the twentieth. In Turner’s story, the earliest scholars of world religions did not actually bracket their own beliefs. He says, the discipline of religious studies was born from a felt need to measure Christianity against alternatives. Such comparison aimed either to make Christianity more persuasive to the ‘heathens’ or to perfect Christianity by locating the elements of a universal religion common to all peopl…
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…, this accounts for how players process some of the violent fantasies that are part of contemporary video games. Two players may be blasting each other away and trash talking within the context of the game, while they are in fact bonding through their play. So, what happens if you exist only within the game, as Tamara does. She makes the point in this episode that she can not escape the consequences of what happens inside the game—because the game…
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…at actual religious symbols and relics were employed in the show. Vampires are scared of crosses, holy water burns their skin. But the cross and holy water neither kills a vampire nor offers any real protection. It’s as if the cross is animated by the one who wields it, and the power within it is useless without them. If you don’t jam the cross in a demon’s face, it is useless. And then there is the time that Buffy used a hammer and sickle to free…
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…dden or incoherent. In this case, the speech was indeed political, but in large part not directly partisan. She took on the specter of sexual abuse directly. Talking Points Memo transcribes: “The fact is that in this election, we have a candidate for president of the United States who, over the course of his lifetime and the course of this campaign has said things about women that are so shocking. So demeaning,” she said. “I simply will not repeat…
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…s responsibility for the tragedy—both as a bad parent and the inventor of hardware that warps young minds—he agrees to go on Sarno’s show. Caprica’s media, not unlike our own, thrives on spectacle and disaster. A terrorist bombing, whose alleged teenage perpetrator is the scion of a rich, privileged family, is spectacularly disastrous. The news story spills into sports, financial, and talk shows with the not-so-hidden subtext of retribution. The p…
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…percentage point, the possible direction in which it’s headed. Even if the numbers are actually in flux and probably don’t mean much for at least another few weeks. AL: You’ve put your finger on something really interesting—the practical uselessness of predictive knowledge this far out. Why check Nate Silver (or Vegas) if you are absolutely certain that three months later the odds will be much more representative of reality? For me it’s at least p…
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…the road to the Eastern Mennonite College at Harrisonburg and asked a similar number of Christian students the same question. Almost every hand shot up. 7. An Evangelical to Restore Scientific Integrity in DC? In August, much to the chagrin of new atheist Sam Harris, Francis Collins, an evangelical Christian who headed the Human Genome Project, was appointed director of the National Institutes of Health. As a prominent scientist, Collins speaks o…
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…cult, because these religions that we explore in the first season are insular, are secretive. Many of them are profoundly suspicious of outsiders. I won’t lie: it took some time to earn their trust. I had the advantage of having a little bit of a reputation—people had heard of me and knew I wasn’t there to make fun of them. I wasn’t there to mock them or to judge them, I was there to understand them. That helped a lot. Once they opened themselves…
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…will be judged on their performance, and not on appeals to identity, which are far more compelling when one is not in power. Anyway, they have done well—they haven’t won landslides. And in Egypt’s case, the Brotherhood may well end up competing with a party that is ideologically more uncomfortable, the Salafis, but organizationally and popularly far less intimidating. But the bigger point here is that the winning Islamist parties have shifted thei…
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…s an iconic figure in 20th century theology; he spent a half a century at Harvard Divinity School, teaching, preaching, and writing. The Market as God expands on an essay of the same name that Cox wrote for The Atlantic back in 1999. The Market as God Harvey Cox Harvard University Press September, 2016 In the book, as in the essay, Cox lays out a scathing critique of modern economics. Using religious analogies, he demonstrates the dangers of corpo…
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