Is Downward Dog the Path to Hell?
Evangelicals and fundamentalist Hindus come together in their denunciation of yoga.
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Secret Sequel: New Age “Mind Cure” Misses the Point
The ancients were wise to life’s tragedies too. Some things do, apparently, go badly. (They could hardly think otherwise, living during that long period of history in which death was associated with the young, not the old.) So, their instruction was to ‘go with the flow’ even when that is hard to stomach. Theirs is not a relentless optimism, expecting everything, like Byrne’s. Rather, the Stoics advocated expecting nothing, but working at everything.
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The High Church of Art
If art is the new religion, then museums are the new temples; temples uniquely suited to the vagaries of spirituality in the modern age.
That is the suggestive idea explored in Marcia Brennan’s new book, Curating Consciousness. Brennan introduces us to James Johnson Sweeney…
Read MoreThe Active Principle of Islam, or, Activating Islamic Principles
Living by the golden rule.
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Better Science Through God?
Much of Steve Fuller’s new book is just a strong way of saying what is entirely uncontroversial among historians of science, even if easily forgotten by most everyone else.
Read MoreHuffPo Columnist Tries to Link Darwin to Hitler
Just what does Mein Kampf have to say about Charles Darwin?
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Who’s Afraid of Sacred Soccer?
A Reforming Tradition Struggles With Change
For progressives in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, the wider Christian church and society at large, the vote was a thrilling victory after decades of struggle and setback. For conservatives, the vote signaled a decisive break with scripture and tradition and called the orthodoxy and orthopraxy of the this denomination into question. Almost one year later, we can take a step back to consider what happened in Minneapolis and to map some of the trajectories of this historic vote.
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New Age Tragedy in Sedona: Non-Indians in the Sweat Lodge
Wealth creation guru James Arthur Ray is under investigation for criminal negligence in the deaths of two participants in a sweat lodge last week. Is this the inevitable result of outsider appropriation of a sacred ritual, or is the story more complex? Our writer, whose own tradition includes the sweat lodge ceremony, explains the nuances.
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The Christian Roots of the New Age: The Aquarian Gospel
In this 1908 retelling of the gospels, Jesus travels to India, Persia, and Greece, preaching of a “cord of love” that binds all humanity. What does The Aquarian Gospel have to teach us about Christianity, New Age religion, and the birth of the culture wars?
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