Frederick Sparks over at Black Skeptics penned a response to my article “Reason and Racism in the New Atheist Movement.” Here are a few of my comments on his analysis. His words are in bold.

Yet if he bothered to read the rest of the book besides the passages criticizing new atheism, he’d see that Hutchinson hardly argues for walling off god belief and African-American religious institutions from criticism.

I’ve never stated or even suggested that African American religion or religion at large should be walled off or shielded from criticism. What I am saying is that religion is incredibly complex and shouldn’t be reduced and dismissed with statements like it “poisons everything” or that it is “child abuse.” In order to resist this totalistic stance I highlighted some ways in which religion has played a positive role in the African American experience. Religion has been used for vast amounts of things – both transformative and destructive and thus we should avoid simplistic dismissals of it (or naive totalistic embraces of it). That’s it. Following Spark’s logic, because I’ve written about the positive role that the Catholic Church and Catholic social teaching has played in Dorothy Day’s life I must believe the Catholic church should be walled off and shielded from being criticized about the child sex abuse scandal. I simply don’t understand this kind of logic.

Perhaps one of the most widespread claims by the New Atheists is that religion is harmful. For Richard Dawkins it is a virus that spreads and infects the mind and is comparable to child abuse. For the late Christopher Hitchens religion “poisons everything” and is a “menace to society.” Greta Christina claims that the belief in supernatural entities makes people “more vulnerable to oppression, fraud and abuse.” Sam Harris likens religion to mental illness. One could go on and on with examples like these.

Given that the New Atheists ground their arguments in science, reason and logic it behooves us to hold these conclusions to very high standards when analyzing them. It goes without saying that truth or knowledge claims should be supported by data, cross-cultural research and empirical evidence whenever possible. This should be measurable and certain principles of reasoning should be employed. Claims of this nature should also be scrutinized amongst a community of experts to try and reach a consensus before drawing conclusions. Unfortunately, the New Atheists fail tremendously in this regard.

Tim Wise has done it again. As America’s leading anti-racist educator and writer he’s identified the next greatest threat to racial justice. It’s a new group of people, that according to Wise, enable a similar world-view as that of the legendary racist and Nazi David Duke. He believes they are “are empowering the reactionary, white supremacist, Social Darwinists of this culture.” For even the most timid members of this group ­- the ones who utter a few words of support – Wise offers no sympathy. Who, according to Wise, would fit into this group?

Cornel West.

Wait, who?

Cornel West.

You mean the most prominent black intellectual in the country? That Cornel West? Yep. The one who Wise has shared the stage with in the past? Yep.

He must have said something pretty terrible to deserve placement in such a category from Mr. Wise. Right?

Cover your ears.

The thing wrong with America is white racism. White folks are not right…It’s time for America to have an intensified study on what’s wrong with white folks. - Dr. King

There may be periods where segregation may be a temporary waystation to a truly integrated society…We don’t want to be integrated out of power; we want to be integrated into power. – Dr. King

I am inclined to think that they [white moderates] are more of a stumbling block to the Negro’s progress than the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner. – Dr. King

The “Decent White Majority”

The standard narrative regarding Dr. King’s approach to racial issues says that he was simply an integrationist who believed that with persuasion, nonviolence and love the conscience of the white majority could be won over and racial justice would be achieved. Racism, as he understood it was mainly psychological. This popular interpretation – the one the mainstream media loves – fails, however, to embrace a holistic view of his mature thinking on white people, institutional racism and white supremacy culture. While for much of his career he optimistically believed the “great decent majority” of whites could be transformed, he began, in 1965, to understand just how deeply embedded racism was and how unwilling white people were to give up privilege and power for the sake of racial justice. Whereas he had once described America in the highest democratic ideals, he began to see it as “a confused…sick, neurotic nation.”

The American Academy of Religion held its annual conference in San Francisco this past weekend. A large gathering that attracts many of the big shots — both progressive and conservative — in religious studies, the AAR meeting provides a space for critical dialogue about religion and the world. Not surprisingly there was a lack of discussion about atheism. But I was pleased to find one panel discussion on Monday morning called, “Beyond Atheistic and Religious Fundamentalism: Imagining the Common Good in the Public Sphere.” However, my excitement quickly turned to disappointment when I realized they forgot to do one important thing: include an atheist.

After the panel, I asked the organizer John Thatamanil of Union Seminary why there was no atheist included in a panel about atheism. He responded that in the quest for diversity he was bound to leave someone out. “Yes,” I said, “but this is a panel about atheism and you left out an atheist.” He responded that there was a Buddhist on the panel and they are atheists. However, it was a scholar of Buddhism on the panel and just because someone is a scholar of a particular religion it doesn’t mean they are practitioners. I have no idea what this person’s beliefs are. But that is beside the point because the Buddhist scholar didn’t represent atheist positions, nor did he defend atheism from the attacks by the other panelists but rather commented on how he felt Buddhism and the Buddha would see this debate.

The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek.
- Joseph Campbell

I can remember the moments just like they happened yesterday. On one occasion my friend and I were standing in the parking lot of my high school next to my gray two-door ’88 Nissan Sentra. He was looking at a paper I had written when he casually said, “you write like a girl.” For some reason, unknowingly to me in that moment, time stopped. His words resonated deep in my body. Despite this event occurring 15 years ago I can tell you the first and last name of the person who said it, the weather outside, the time of day, where we were standing in relation to my car…etc. Another time a high school friend told me that my leopard print steering wheel cover “was for girls.” When I bought it I had never even thought twice about it. It was simply what I wanted. But, again time stopped and I became extremely present. On one occasion a coworker told me I looked like a woman. His words shook me. All of these incidents shook me. While I wasn’t thinking this at the time I suppose at some deep level my spirit was saying in each occasion, “Oh, my god he knows.”

When these incidents occurred – in high school and in my early twenties I had never heard the word transgender before. This was in the mid 90′s and early 2000′s. I’m sure I’d heard the term transexual used in a pejorative manner, but my knowledge was extremely limited. Like many other teenage boys I had been called “gay,” “fag,” or “sissy” and a whole wide range of other terms – typical of the homophobia rampant in our culture. I know that I also participated in this homophobia by joining my guy friends in using this kind of language with each other. We’d also throw around sexist and racist jokes not realizing the impact these types of words have in everyday lives of people of color and women. But, despite me being called gay or fag those moments never stayed with me. I can’t remember even one specific incident in which I was called this, yet I can remember in painstaking detail the times I had been called a woman or a girl.

The developed industrial nations of the world cannot remain secure islands of prosperity in a seething sea of poverty. The storm is rising against the privileged minority of the earth, from which there is no shelter in isolation or armament. The storm will not abate until a just distribution of the fruits of the earth enables man everywhere to live in dignity and human decency. – Dr. King

In another moment of Great American Irony President Obama inaugurated the Dr. King memorial this week in Washington D.C. He not only invoked the legacy of King but he also spoke favorably of the Occupy Wall Street movement and said King would support it. Yes, of course, King would back the cause. However, despite winning a Nobel Peace Prize, Obama hasn’t shown any willingness to address King’s triple evils of “war, economic exploitation and racism.” These also happen to be similar concerns for many in the Occupy Wall Street movement. Obama should, however, be careful about who and what he praises because the Occupy movement is expanding and Dr. King’s final campaign was going to bring the revolution close to home. He said, “We’ve got to camp in – put our tents in front of the White House…America will have many many days, but they will be full of trouble. There will be no rest, there will be no tranquility in this country until the nation comes to terms with our problem.”

On Dr. King’s birthday, Jan. 15th 1968 – which was sadly to be his last – he was organizing with a multi-racial coalition of Native Americans, Chicanos, Appalachian whites and urban black people to start an encampment in Washington D.C. that would be a massive “nonviolent army” which would “cripple the operation of an oppressive society.” By 1968, King’s earlier emphasis on civil rights had evolved into a revolutionary stance against capitalism, the Vietnam War, U.S. Imperialism and poverty. Leading tens of thousands of poor people, activists, clergy and concerned citizens to camp in D.C. was a “kind of last, desperate demand for the nation to respond to nonviolence.” He even suggested to his staff that after a few days they could call in the peace movements and “try and close down the Pentagon.” King meant business. The encampment would have to be “as dramatic, as dislocative, as attention-getting as the riots without destroying life or property.” He talked about clogging the roads, shutting down bridges and making the “city not function anymore.” The country that he loved so much had strayed so far from its ideals that he said, “We’ve got to go for broke this time…they aren’t going to run me out of Washington.”

On Thursday, Sept. 29th over 1,000 people marched in San Francisco to voice their frustration against the corrupt financial institutions that have been harming the lives of millions. It was the latest effort in what is a quickly spreading movement. While New York is the largest, there are Occupy movements cropping up in every city – Chicago, Miami, Seattle, LA, Boston and Reno just to name a few.

For those who missed it, the SF march was energetic and filled with passionate, yet frustrated voices. Marching from the former Bank of America headquarters on California street, the group staged a massive picket in front of Charles Schwab. Some entered the lobby while many more tried to push their way in. One protester stood inside with a sign that said “revolution is beautiful.”

After leaving a lasting impression at Charles Schwab the group headed to Chase bank on Market street. Six people were able to get inside the bank and do a sit in, while others filled the entry way lobby in support. The police prevented any more people from entering the bank. Outside, the massive crowd cheered for those inside, “Let our people go, arrest the CEO.” Life sized cardboard images of Chase CEO Jamie Dimon were set against the backdrop of the bank. All six members inside were arrested and cited and then released out a side entrance to cheers and excitement from the crowd.

It takes a special type of warrior to drop bombs on someone. You have to be able to cultivate a certain amount of mental clarity, presence, focus and inner calm. That’s why for some, yoga is the perfect tool to help get the job done.

In August, 2006 Fit Yoga Magazine featured on their front cover a picture of two naval aviators practicing yoga on a battleship. What pose were they in? Of course Virabadrasana 2, aka warrior pose. At the time even the editor of magazine admitted that it was a “little shocking,” but on second glance she realized that “on their faces their serene smiles relayed a sense of inner calm.”

According to Retired Adm. Tom Steffens the Navy Seals dig yoga too, “The ability to stay focused on something, whether on breathing or on the yoga practice, and not be drawn off course, that has a lot of connection to the military,” he said. “In our SEAL basic training, there are many things that are yoga-like in nature.” And in March 2011 the Military officially added yoga and “resting” to the required physical training regiment all in the effort to “better prepare soldiers for the rigors of combat.”

If you’re not in the Military and don’t have any plans to join up anytime soon, no worries. Just tune to the Pentagon channel’s “Fit For Duty” which is “a show by the military, for the military.” Major Lisa Lourey will teach you all the yoga you need to know to become a highly trained killing machine. It’s my top choice for online asana.

Greta Christina argues that a personal belief in God will make you more likely to harm others and embrace an “extreme, grotesque immorality.”

In her rebuttal to my article “5 Myths Atheists Believe About Religion,” (reprinted on Alternet.org) Greta Christina claims that I’ve reproduced religious privilege and oppression. How? Because I used the word “myth” and associated it with atheists. According to Christina by using the word myth (which I could easily interchange in this case with “have wrong,” or “incorrect”) I’m in the same category as all of those people who attack atheists with harmful slurs. “Bigoted myths about atheists abound — myths that we’re amoral, selfish, hateful, despairing, close-minded, nihilistic, arrogant, intolerant, forcing our lack of belief on others, etc. — and many of us experience real discrimination as a result.” Thus, by me calling Christina’s claim that all religions are equally crazy a myth I am somehow in the same boat as someone who hates and oppresses atheists. While myth may not be the grammatically correct word I’m uncertain as to how my article would cease to be oppressive if I had merely used “have wrong” or “wrong belief” instead of myth. Again, the substance of what I wrote is not an issue for her. Rather it’s one word, myth. Her logic entails that if I called Malcolm X’s early belief that all white people are devils a myth then I am supporting or contributing to all racist and white supremacist myths about black people. I don’t follow this line of thinking.

I am deeply concerned about religious privilege and the dehumanization of atheists. I recently wrote an article “If I Were an Atheist I Wouldn’t Trust the Religious Either” describing the problematic nature of trying to incorporate atheists into interfaith work. I’ve also previously written how religious people need to defend atheists against attack and dehumanization. In using the word myth it was synonymous with untruth or incorrect. It is possible for atheists or anyone else to believe wrong things about religion. Pointing this out is not oppressive or discriminatory. Otherwise all religious people must remain silent and not critique atheists. Nor is using the term myth to describe a wrong belief. Maybe it isn’t the best choice of words or the most grammatically correct, but myth isn’t a dirty word nor does saying the word invoke all other awful myths associated with any given category. We use it everyday very commonly despite it perhaps not being the accurate choice of word at the time.

The vast majority of religious and spiritual people don’t really care about atheists and that’s why if I were an atheist I wouldn’t trust them as far as I could throw a Bible. At worst, many religious people and their associated institutions are responsible for a long history of dehumanizing atheists. A most recent example is that of the atheist senior high school student Damon Fowler. After objecting to the illegal publicly sponsored prayer scheduled for his graduation ceremony he was “hounded, pilloried, and ostracized by his community; publicly demeaned by one of his teachers; physically threatened; and thrown out by his parents, who cut off his financial support, kicked him out of the house, and threw his belongings onto the front porch.” At best, progressive religious organizations may include articles from authors that are atheist, advance viewpoints that are humanistic or attempt to engage atheists in interfaith work. This may be stepping in the right direction but it should be viewed for what it is; tokenism. Until the real-life social and political struggles that atheists face are taken up by religious and spiritual people in a serious manner I doubt any genuine progress will be made.

While there are some atheists who are willing to work under the rubric of an interfaith movement and other atheists who identify as religious such as Buddhists and Unitarian Universalists it seems that many atheists don’t want to integrate into religion. Can you blame them? Why would these atheists want to integrate into the very thing they feel is oppressing them? Yes, common goals of challenging religious fundamentalism and community service can be shared by both groups but why does it have to be done under the guise of religion as interfaith organizing?

Prominent atheist and scientist PZ Myers has written a rebuttal called “Myth-bustin’ bad arguments about atheism” to my article “5 Myths Atheists Believe About Religion.” I respond to his criticism below but I must say it seems he largely misunderstood the points I was making. I’m not saying this just to try and prime my audience, but I found myself mostly answering to claims that I’ve never made.

I do appreciate the discussion and hope that it spurs healthy debate. We need more dialogue and engagement with these very important issues. His comments are in blue.

Liberal and Moderate Religion Justifies Religious Extremism. Scofield has completely missed the point. Liberal religion isn’t blamed for promoting illiberalism, it’s guilty of promoting religion. Nobody is arguing that the antithesis is responsible for the thesis, but that liberal religion and extremist religion hold something in common: the abdication of reason in favor of faith. They are both philosophies that undermine critical thinking. And without that safeguard of demanding reasonable evidence for propositions, they’re left vulnerable to bad ideas.

PZ Myers proves my point exactly and simultaneously points out his own hypocrisy.

The popular atheist writer/blogger Greta Christina calls one of Hitchens’ ideas about religion a “terrible argument.”

You know that Christopher Hitchens is not a fan of religion. If you had any doubt you can read his best-selling book God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, watch him debate leading Christian and religious theologians (on one occasion four of them at a time) or read any of the numerous articles he’s written on the subject. Yet, despite his public outcry and comparison of religion to child abuse and labeling it a “menace to society” readers may be surprised to discover that he is actually indifferent to religion as long as it produces good behavior. Shocking I know. Furthermore he’s admitted that he’s not arguing “religion should or ever would die out in the world.”

In God is Not Great Hitchens describes a story of how a Muslim cab driver went to great lengths to return a large sum of money that his wife had left in his cab. When the the cab driver told him that it was his religious duty to return the money and refused a generous reward that Hitchens had offered it seems to have sparked a unique moment of shared humanity for Hitchens with a religious person. In response to the Muslim cab driver’s act of selfless service Hitchens makes a shocking admission, “And if all Muslims conducted themselves like the man who gave up more than a week’s salary in order to do the right thing, I could be quite indifferent to the weird exhortations of the Koran” (p. 188). Hitchens is essentially saying that as long as religion produces good behavior the strange and peculiar commandments, beliefs and ideas are not a problem. He could have said as he has said elsewhere that religion is not needed to do good or to know right from wrong. Or he could have acted on his statement, “I think religion should be treated with ridicule, hatred and contempt, and I claim that right.” But he didn’t. There was no ridicule for the cab driver. Instead, like many of us progressive religious people Hitchens demonstrated tolerance and a level of respect to this religious person and his beliefs.

In the wake of the latest Wikileaks releases and the predictable response to them by the powers that be we can look to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as an example of someone who persistently and emphatically rejected the standard fear mongering of the political and media establishment. It wasn’t just his powerful critique of the Vietnam War or U.S. foreign policy that deserves attention. We should also remember his explicit distrust of the government fed sound bytes that were designed to evoke base emotions and win popular support for an often illegal and unethical foreign policy. King was so skeptical of his government that he actually advised, “the more difficult but no less necessary task is to speak for those who have been designated our enemies” (emphasis added). The tribalistic demonization of entire groups, whether communists or the Vietnamese people was due partly to, King believed, an America gripped by a “war psychosis” that needed to be confronted head on. He stated, “We must demonstrate, teach and preach until the very foundations of our nation shake.” And while it is speculation or perhaps an educated guess on my part, I believe King may have viewed Wikileaks as one of those necessary forms of protest.

King left a staunchly anti-Imperialist legacy which questioned the very fabric of the American Empire. From his early days in graduate school King wrote of the dangers of the “False God of Nationalism” (PDF) which he referred to as a religion.

The watchword of this new religion is “My country right or wrong.” This new religion has its familiar prophets and preachers. In Germany it was preached by Hitler In Italy it was preached by Mussilini [sic]. And in America it is being preached by the McCarthy’s and the Jenners, the advocators of white supremacy, and the America first movements.

The preachers of this new religion are so convinced of its supremacy that they are determined to persecute anyone who does not accept its tenets. And so today many sincere lovers of democracy and believers of the Christian principle are being scorned and persecuted because they will not worship the god of nationalism. We live in an age when it is almost heresy to affirm the brotherhood of man…

According to King the U.S. was the “largest purveyor of violence in the world.” He criticized its economic policies that made possible the racist Apartheid government of South Africa, denounced the use of American military force to crush people power revolutions in Latin America and spoke out against the dangerous pairing of capitalism and the military industrial complex to exploit third world countries. Capitalism according to King had “outlived its usefulness” and was “like a losing football team in the last quarter trying all types of tactics to survive.” The triple evils so perpetuated by the U.S. were poverty, racism and war and he boldly used his public position as a religious and moral leader to speak out against them. He sought to bring a direct challenge to “the deadly Western arrogance that has poisoned the international atmosphere for so long.”

This is a satirical response to “How to Write about the Gnu Atheists, a Guide” which is itself a satirical rebuttal to the way the new atheists have been characterized by critics. For the most part I agree with the points raised in the piece and hope religious critics of the new atheists will reflect on it. I am writing this piece to simply point out that the new atheists have over generalized and distorted religion in many of the same ways that critics of the new atheists have critiqued them. Thus, this is my satirical “guide” for new atheists who are critiquing religion and seeking the best methods for their approach.

How to Write about the Religulous

The first and most important thing to do when writing about the religulous is to conflate all religion with the belief in a supernatural god. By identifying all religion with an abusive and cruel “celestial dictator” it will ensure the maximum ability to attack and ridicule your target. It also provides the advantage of avoiding the complexity of various religious people who use the words God, sacred or divine but do not mean an omnipotent personal being or anything outside or above the laws of the universe. To help make your case you can borrow this line from popular anti-religious atheist blogger Greta Christina, “The thing that uniquely defines religion is belief in supernatural entities. Without that belief, it’s not religion.” Or this one from Christopher Hitchens (author of God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything), “To be religious is to be a theist.” Following this definition it’s crucial that you primarily focus on the Abrahamic faiths and ignore things like the Buddhist Churches of America (the oldest Buddhist group in the U.S.) Sure they meet on Sunday mornings, sing hymns, sit in pews, use sacred texts, send their children to Sunday school and listen to a reverend or minister. But they don’t believe in a supernatural god so they don’t really count and you can safely ignore them. It’s better to take the Buddhists off the “religion can be harmful radar” because a lot of liberal Westerners see Buddhists as pure, esoteric, spiritual and enlightened, so it’s best not to confuse these good people by including Buddhists among the religulous.

Perhaps like Sam Harris you do believe that Buddhism is a religion. If you agree you have two options. One is to ignore all the good things Buddhists have done and focus on the bad things: list all the wars Buddhists have fought or discuss abusive eastern gurus, for example. We explain how to do this below, but the key point is that the bad things are the result of the religion, the good things are not. This tactic works well with Christianity. If you can’t make it work with Buddhism your second option is to argue for the elimination of Buddhism as a religion as Harris does in the essay “Killing the Buddha.” But to do that you must make sure not to discuss the contents of any World Religion text as it might be confusing to introduce more atheist religions such as Taoism, Confucianism, Jainism and other strands of Buddhism. And at all costs avoid mention of Unitarian Universalism, a religion with 19% atheists and 30% agnostics.

Whatever you do, don’t admit that you can be an atheist without being anti-religious.

I’ve received many comments and questions regarding my analysis of Off the Mat in the “Beyond Spiritual Activism” article. There is a lively discussion happening for certain. Some of the comments are very thought provoking and tough. I’ve been spending a lot of time trying to respond to individual questions but realize that there are many similar issues being brought up and so I wanted to address them in a post. Also, Off the Mat has responded to my article in the comments section and I responded. They are preparing a list of what they consider to be factual inaccuracies in my post which Tikkun Daily will post on the front page of the blog under “Guest – Off the Mat,” not just under the comments section. I fully welcome any critique and corrections. As with any other writer people should question my motives and conclusions and point out any factual inaccuracies.

I understand there are a lot of impassioned voices in this conversation. I’m very used to it as I’ve written about these kinds of things previously. When I wrote about how racism and oppression manifests in the positive thinking culture I received a very similar response. These are some comments on “When Positive Thinking Becomes Religion“:

“This is a terrifically important article,” “This brilliant introduction by Be of some of the dangers of pop destiny picking-for others…is a HUGE help,” “Thank you for a long overdue, intelligent critique of the poisonous nonsense that keeps so many people enslaved to positive thinking,” and “Wow – this is a thorough, engaging and really useful discussion of The Law of Attraction. I am so glad you wrote it!”

There were unfavorable comments as well. What did a teacher of The Secret and a devout practitioner of the Law of Attraction say?

“Your gross generalizations, not all of which are true, lack of objectivity and the “axe to grind” tone sounds more angry and biased…Being angry, taking things out of context and criticizing others may only feel good temporarily.” A devout practitioner of The Law of Attraction states, “This article is so unapologetically biased and filled with absurdities cloaked in typical sensationalist writing it’s laughable…it would appear that your opinion is largely based on conjecture and sound bites as opposed to direct experience and application…perhaps you should have interviewed a few people who actually practice the principles.”

It’s the latest term being used to describe how the search for the highest self can be bridged with social change: spiritual activism. Now more than ever you can hear yoga instructors, meditation teachers, small groups and personal life coaches speaking about the value of taking spiritual principles into the world for the betterment of the planet. Yoga Kula [formerly Yoga Sangha], a San Francisco studio, hosted a “Spiritual Activation” series in 2007 where inspirational talks by John Robbins, Julia Butterfly Hill and Jack Kornfield were followed by a yoga class. For the yogi or engaged Buddhists seeking to become involved in activism, there are numerous new organizations and opportunities: you can volunteer to teach yoga in prisons or the juvenile justice system, fly to Cambodia or Africa to serve people, create your own local service project for social change, take a yoga class for cancer and HIV awareness, or support yoga teachers in Africa. Transformation is in the air. What was once the domain for an individual’s spiritual and physical growth is quickly becoming a useful resource to harness a new force for social justice. And with over 20 million yoga practitioners in America, and as more and more people seek spirituality in non-religious ways, it has the potential to be a powerful movement. This new spirit of transformation is all wonderful, right? Not exactly.

As an activist and yoga instructor I’m all for inspiring people to make a difference in the world. And this new spiritual activism movement has lots of potential. But taking the best of what is taught on the yoga mat off into the world, as one program advertises, isn’t enough to create just and sustainable communities for social change. Nor is meditation or a personal spiritual practice. Why not? Because yoga or meditation do not teach about how power functions to maintain oppressive systems such as racism, cultural imperialism, and patriarchy. Without this perspective we stand the risk of reproducing some of the most harmful effects of them. In Acting With Compassion: Buddhism, Feminism and the Environmental Crisis, Stephanie Kaza illustrates the importance of bridging spirituality with an understanding power dynamics, “Political, economic, and personal power can serve the environment, if illuminated by awareness and social consciousness of the logic of domination. Without this awareness, the critical role of power can be overlooked by the Buddhist practitioner focusing on the beauty and miracle of interdependence.” Recognizing that our activism — despite peaceful and loving intentions — can actually cause harm with or without our being aware of it is a crucial component to a just and sustainable future. In other words the impact of our actions is more important than our intentions. This awareness is a central component of an anti-racist approach to social justice. Let’s remember that the intentions of the 18th & 19th century Christian missionaries were mostly good as they sought to help civilize and educate.

Seane Corn - International celebrity yoga teacher and founder of Off the Mat, Into the World.

One of the most prominent leaders of this fast growing spiritual activism movement is the international yoga celebrity Seane Corn. As a pioneer in the field she has successfully combined the art of yoga with motivational leadership designed to empower people to make a difference in the world. Corn got her start teaching yoga to at-risk teenage girls in L.A. and became a YouthAIDS ambassador in 2005 to help raise funds and awareness about the HIV/AIDS crisis. She received both harsh criticism and support in 2001 when she represented Nike and took part in a commercial for them called, “Nike Goddess.” She defended her actions by saying that Nike explained to her that they had made progress in their manufacturing efforts in the global south. With her non-profit Off the Mat Into the World (OTM) she is now trying to bridge spirituality and activism and train a new breed of leaders by tapping into the market of 20 million yogis in the United States. One of the central projects are their “Seva Challenge” or “Bare Witness” trips which lead people to Cambodia, Uganda and South Africa for service. As I illustrate below, this well-known spiritual activism group is well-intentioned but it produces problematic issues of paternalism, “feel-good” service, white U.S.-centric privilege and racism. Understanding how this program reproduces some of these forms of oppression can provide some insights for the future of the spiritual activism movement. And for those combining yoga — still a predominantly white middle class phenomenon — with service, lessons can be gained about the more complex dimensions of social justice.

Esther-Hicks channels magnetic entities which she calls "Abraham"

Rhonda Byrne, author of the best selling DVD/book "The Secret" is releasing a sequel in August called "The Power."

We must understand that the founder of a cult or new religion has no room for compromise: absolutes are necessary. True believers in mystical psychotherapy will not embrace a gospel with modest claims: it must be all or nothing. – Martin Larson

“He could go to school and daydream.” That was the advice given by positive thinking guru, law of attraction teacher and “channel” Esther Hicks aka “Abraham” to a black woman who asked how her son should approach learning about the difficult history of slavery in school. After telling the curious mother “none of that [slavery] has anything to do with him,” and that “he won’t have to deal with it” Abraham-Hicks proceeded to equate the teaching of African-American history with a family legacy of passing down “bad” feelings. But this is nothing compared to what she said about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. When the woman asked her about a way to interpret his life in an empowering way for her son Esther-Hicks launched into something that can be best described as an ignorant stream of psychobabble. She described his vision in the vaguest of terms and then said, “He lost sight of his dream momentarily…he began to push against. And when one pushes against in a very fast moving stream abrupt things happened…It’s trying to get others to agree with us about our dreams that causes backlash. But when we just dream them ourselves…the resources of the universe come into alignment with us.” Blaming Dr. King for his own death was paired with her instruction to the woman to not tell her son about the unjust things that Dr. King had to struggle against. Her point was that slavery, racism and segregation are all “negative” and so therefore we aren’t supposed to think about them. And if all of this wasn’t bad enough, when responding to a question on Oprah’s radio show about how the law of attraction would lead to a young girl attracting her own rape and murder, Esther-Hicks responded by saying parents don’t teach their children how to think properly and they are influenced by the negative thinking of the adults around them. She told Oprah, “if they are listening to the guidance within they could not comfortably ever settle on the thoughts that would lead them to attract something unwanted.”

Christopher Hitchens’s book God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything is a lengthy and detailed description of what happens when religious people behave badly. And this apparent correlation between religion and bad behavior is perhaps one of the most common reasons cited by the new atheists as to why all religion should be abandoned. But does Hitchens really believe religion causes people to do bad things? As I illustrate his position is unclear.

An interview with Jian Ghomeshi on QTV reveals the double standard that Hitchens has about the cause/effect relationship of religion and human behavior.

Jian Ghomeshi: I think you would be hard pressed to find a religious person to claim that there’s never been any negative implications or violence or wicked deeds that have been done in the name of religion.

Hitchens: They say in the name of. It’s not in the name of. That’s their get out clause. You echo it yourself. It’s explicit; it’s part of the religion. The most celebrated action of the Abrahamic is the willingness of someone to gut and murder his own son because he thinks it will please God…It’s not in the name of. It’s in the word of God himself. The commandments and instructions. These are warrants for genocide, rape, slavery, infant mutilation and worse.

Hitchens has also stated, “Religion kills,” “is violent” and “has caused innumerable people not just to conduct themselves no better than others, but to award themselves permission to behave in ways that would make a brothel-keeper or an ethnic cleanser raise an eyebrow.” He has also said, “The evil things missionaries do are definitely done because of religion.” Hitchens tries to draw a direct correlation between the violent behavior of people and their religion. His book God is Not Great is mostly a chronicle of all of the horrendous things done by people who are religious. And he disagrees with Ghomeshi who says wicked deeds have been done in the name of religion. But if something is not done in the name of religion how else does it occur? According to Hitchens religion has the magical power to make people do things. But for Hitchens religion only has the power to make people do wicked things. Anything good done in the name of religion is strictly due to human nature and nothing else, “Human decency is not derived from religion. It precedes it.” After discussing some awful acts carried out by people who are religious Hitchens states, “At minimum this makes it impossible to argue that religion causes people to behave in a more kindly or civilized matter.” But in the same interview on QTv he states [emphasis added],

Jian Ghomeshi: Would you agree that there is anything in the world that that has been done in the name of religion that is positive?

Hitchens: Things done by Jimmy Carter are done by Jimmy Carter. If you’re telling me people wouldn’t help build affordable housing if they weren’t Baptist fundamentalists…