halloween

Culture

Death Couture: Not For Halloween Only

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The highway that leads from the Mayan ruins of Chichen Itza back to the resort-lined coast of the Yucatan Peninsula runs straight through several small towns. And there beside the Virgin of Guadalupe and San Judas Tadeo a gargantuan lawn statue of La Santa Muerte—Mexico’s patroness saint of death—looms over the rest.

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(A)theologies

Occupy’s Sacred Mob and the Politics of Vagrancy

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Recent analyses of religion in the 99% Movement tend to begin with a focus simply on pluralism, asking how diverse forms of religious transcendence—particularly in justice-minded congregations—have aligned themselves with the still-growing wave of Occupations. But the intimacy of life in a park or along a sidewalk is causing traditions to do something more than “coexist” plurally. Religions are colluding and combining.

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Culture

All Candy, No Jesus: Halloween in America

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We Americans don’t like to talk about death or the dead, and since many Protestants have difficuty with Catholic practices around prayer to the saints and prayers for the dead, our practices around All Saints’ and All Souls’ days have drifted in very different directions, leaving more space for the secular, non-religious practices around these festivals.

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(A)theologies

Bishops vs. Nuns: Who Spoke for God in 2010?

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By remaining silent on the issue of bullying, and by undertaking an extensive nationwide campaign against marriage equality—a basic civil rights issue that has little or nothing to do with religious definitions—the bishops have themselves not only failed to live up to their obligation to protect the vulnerable, but have in some sense become bullies.

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