Religion Dispatches
…sses in the Hamptons (which includes early class signups) runs for $4,000. New York magazine interviewed one New York City rider who, by the magazine’s estimate, was spending more than $21,000 on SoulCycle each year. A single class, sans early sign-up perks, costs nearly as much as a month-long membership at my local YMCA. Meanwhile, back on SoulCycle’s website, instructors describe their work in frankly spiritual language. Here’s the lightly cond…
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…e new mass of it surfacing in California. From its earliest days, many of New Thought’s leading teachers and practitioners and promoters were women, which is not to say that women are more credulous but which is to say that women may well experience more suffering in an androcentric America. What was first called New Thought in William James’s time came to be known as New Age thinking toward the end of the 20th century (Mark Oppenheimer’s profi…
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…t influential positions were as Director of the Simon Guggenheim Museum in New York (1952-1960); he was there when the new building designed by Frank Lloyd Wright opened, though he was ambivalent about it, worrying that the space was designed to promote the architect, not a spiritual experience of inner space. And then he served as Director of the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston (1961-1967). The shows Sweeney curated, the work he collected, and the…
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…graphical is the feeling of alienation; of being Jewish when you’re not in New York. Because some of the things I experienced in different countries, like these characters did, where, when you leave your enclaves, like New York and L.A., and you go to places like London or Warsaw, it’s still kind of weird to be Jewish. It’s just not that big of a deal in a lot of cities in America. But when you go abroad, you realize it’s a different thing to be….
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…n the language so that it had—not playfulness, but just, “this is the best new evidence. This is the best new story we got going now.” Here’s the critique: that, “the universe is expanding” is a very loose way of talking about love or personal development. It’s a superficial connection between things that are substantially different. If the metaphor breaks down, [at least] I took a valiant effort at connecting a few things. Malcolm Gladwell, who e…
Read More…d harassment of human rights defenders.” Uganda: Museveni says no need for new anti-gay law Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni said publicly that there is no need for a new anti-gay law because the country already bans same-sex sexual behavior. Anti-gay lawmakers have been pushing for re-passage of the Anti Homosexuality Act that was overturned by a court for procedural reasons. Ireland: Marriage equality a reality by year’s end The Belfast Telegra…
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…ted States continues under the fraught leadership of Donald Trump, we find new iterations of the “Christian nation,” new connections and clashes between immigration bans, the religious right, and women’s rights. But if oppression relies on strange alliances, so does resistance. Sowing the seeds of liberation often entails looking back to the past and reaffirming elements of one’s own traditions, persons, and events that have been overlooked or wil…
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…she is an American socialist. She comes from that background. I grew up in New York, she grew up in New York. I’m very familiar with the sort of Jewish socialist culture in New York, which has an enormous pedigree, has done wonderful things in promoting a way of life and developing American society, but at the end of the day is still socialist. This is a slightly disguised echo of the charge that has circulated among anti-Semites at least as early…
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…peaks directly to God,” be updated each time the church gets a new president? At least Russell M. Nelson has the same cadence as Thomas S. Monson, so the transition to new lyrics should be about as seamless as the transition to a new straight white American male LDS president….
Read More…anti-religion ethos.’” Netherlands: Former Right-Wing Politician Launches New Islamic Party According to news reports, “Arnoud van Doorn, a former far-right Dutch politician and a former friend of notorious anti-Muslim propagandist Geert Wilders, but later accepted Islam and became a Muslim, has announced his plans to launch a new Islamic party in his native Holland.” The Islamic Party for Unity will be contending for three seats in the upcoming…
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