Culture

Guest Post: "Making the Internet Moral," By Chris Stedman

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Is the Internet destroying our morals? Earlier this month, Pope Benedict XVI issued a warning that the Internet was “numbing” young people and creating an “educational emergency – a challenge that we can and must respond to with creative intelligence.” Speaking at a Vatican conference on culture, Benedict also expressed concern that “a large number of young people” are “establish[ing] forms of communication that do not increase humaneness but instead risk increasing a sense of solitude and disorientation.” Benedict’s comments created an uproar, but he has a point.Studies show that Internet addiction is linked to depression; in 2007, the comedy websiteCracked offered a surprisingly moving take on this phenomenon titled “7 Reasons the 21st Century is Making You Miserable.” It’s tempting, knowing this, to suggest that we all take a step away from our keyboards, turn off our computers, and go find a field to frolic in.

Gender and Sexuality

An Apology and a Question

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It takes a certain amount of chutzpah to blog, something I have been learning about over these past few months. You have to be pretty sure of yourself. But sometimes, the ethically and spiritually right thing to do is apologize. And I owe you my readers an apology. (We’ll get to the question later.

Culture

Gratitude: What a Chore

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Why is it so hard to be grateful? In the churches of my childhood, the ministers would intone, “Let us give thanks,” perhaps after the collection plate had been passed, and we would all bow our heads and go through the motions. I don’t remember feeling actual gratitude. But that wasn’t for lack of reminding. A hymn too exhorted us, “Count your Blessings.

Politics & Society

Try a Spiritual Progressive Approach to Thanksgiving This Year!

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No matter how difficult it may be in a world filled with pain and cruelty, there are moments when it is important to stop looking at all the problems and focus on all the good. And that’s part of what Thanksgiving could be about for you this year. Life is so amazing, and our universe so awesome, filled with realities that transcend our capacity to comprehend, and inviting us to awe and wonder and radical amazement! Give yourself and your friends a day dedicated to truly feeling those kinds of feelings! I don’t mean only a moment of sharing “something we all appreciate” during the traditional meal.

Christianity

Spiritual Wisdom of the Week

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This week’s spiritual wisdom comes to us from progressive activist and novelist James T. Dette, who urges Christians today to reflect on their Jewish roots. A native of New Jersey, Dette has long been active in local and national politics, and has contributed to such publications as The New York Times, Irish America, and Street News. THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO JOHN
I grew up in a Jewish neighborhood in Passaic, New Jersey, two blocks from the synagogue, Ahavas Israel. Most of my boyhood friends were Jews. My Irish mother played mah-jongg with her Jewish neighbors.

Christianity

Faith, Feminism, and Finding a Balance

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Last weekend I was invited to take part in the 4th annual Faith and Feminism/Womanist/Mujerista conference at herchurch in San Francisco. The theme this year was “Reclaiming the Divine Feminine — pathways to a sustainable world.” Now, I consider myself a feminist in that I support equal rights and protection for women and believe that women have unique experiences that give them a different perspective on life and different needs than men, but I’m not the type to identify myself as a feminist first and foremost. And I’ve never been to a feminist conference. You could probably call me a mainstream feminist.

Education

Young Jewish Activists Attract Positive Press for Anti-Occupation Message

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by Wendy Elisheva Somerson
The five young Jewish activists who disrupted Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s speech in New Orleans earlier this week shouted familiar criticisms of the Occupation. What was unexpected and new was the way the U.S. and Israeli media portrayed the protest, seeming to hear the critiques with fresh ears and unusual sympathy. The five activists from the Young Leadership Institute of Jewish Voice for Peace disrupted Netanyahu’s speech at the Jewish Federation’s General Assembly on Monday, November 8, five separate times. The first activist unfurled a banner that read, “The Loyalty Oath delegitimizes Israel” and yelled the same message until she was escorted out of the hall by security. Separated by pauses of a few minutes, the four remaining protesters each unfurled banners and yelled similar messages while they were escorted out: “Silencing dissent delegitimizes Israel,” “Occupation delegitimizes Israel,” “The siege on Gaza delegitimizes Israel,” and finally, “The settlements betray Jewish values.”

art

How to Write about the Religulous, a Guide

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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.

Rethinking Religion

Spiritual Wisdom of the Week

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Security and Peace
By Jonathan Granoff

May God’s grace and peace be with us In the name of God, the Most Merciful, Most Compassionate. We are all interested in peace and security. Inner peace, the source of peace, is an inside job. One important aspect of a healthy inner life is prayer. The evidence of real prayer is whether it opens the heart to love, regardless of whether we pray quietly, out loud, within a tradition, out of a tradition, facing the east, the west, up or down.

Culture

On Evolution, Vaccination, and Global Warming: The Cost of Magical Thinking

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When I was a teenager I believed that science was the route to all the best answers to the most important questions. I would have applauded Sir Ernest Rutherford’s dictum: “There is physics and there is stamp-collecting.” It took the sixties to loosen up my views, to help me recognize that there were things not measurable by science, but true none the less. Love and literature were two early examples; the power of spirituality came later. Today my views are closer to what Stephen Jay Gould called Nonoverlapping Magisteria , the perspective that there are areas of expertise over which science holds sway, and other areas over which it does not, and that wisdom can best be reached through exploring both.