Morehead's Musings

Interview with Joseph Gelfer on 2012: Decoding the Countercultural Apocalypse

2012-02-01T10:58:00.002-07:00

A new interview has been posted with Joseph Gelfer, editor of the new book 2012: Decoding the Countercultural Apocalypse, at Sacred Tribes Journal: http://www.sacredtribesjournal.org/stj/

Following is an excerpt.

Sacred Tribes Journal: Thank you for your willingness to discuss the book. It is a good read, and obviously, a timely one this year. What was your personal interest in 2012 as an alleged doomsday period in Mayan prophecy that led you to pull together this collection of scholars to explore the subject?

Joseph Gelfer: I first came to 2012 after reading Daniel Pinchbeck’s book “Breaking Open the Head” in which the author documents his psychedelically-inspired awakening to a world beyond his previously rationalist and journalistic mindset. I looked Pinchbeck up on the Internet, exchanged a few emails and began to partake in conversations with him and other readers on his discussion forum. References to 2012 can be seen in the earliest threads on the forum, in which Pinchbeck highlights the 2012 predictions of (amongst others) José Argüelles and Terence McKenna. This was all before I was engaged in academic research. At the time I was also doing a bit of writing for what could be described as “new age” magazines: 2012 surfaced in a couple of those articles, and even resulted in a picture of me appearing in a 13 moon synchronometer, which is a device used to map Argüelles’ Dreamspell calendar onto our Gregorian calendar. After I began my PhD exploring masculine spirituality, I remained interested in 2012, but began to view it via a more analytical lens. It was about this time that Robert Sitler published his article “The 2012 Phenomenon: New Age Appropriation of an Ancient Mayan Calendar,” which catalyzed thinking about 2012 in the scholarly domain as not only a subject for Mayanists, but also one for cultural and religious studies. Then something odd happened. I was living at the time in New Zealand’s South Island, and discovered that Argüelles had also moved from the US to the other side of the island, so I began to speculate about the role that Australasia might play as the 2012 narrative unfolded, and developed a research agenda around this speculation. Shortly after, I moved to Victoria in Australia, and discovered that Argüelles had made a similar move. Of course, this is a handy coincidence, but when I eventually met Argüelles in Mexico a couple of years later and told him this story, he saw it as a string of synchronicities that were “meant” to happen. Who am I to argue?

Stephen Webb on Mormon Dialogue and Alternative Rules of the Game

2012-01-22T13:46:00.003-07:00

An excerpt from Stephen Webb's Jesus Christ, Eternal God (Oxford University Press, 2011):

Bluntly put, Mormons do not play by the rules of the Nicene Creed. Their theological arguments can look like a form of cheating when, in reality, they are trying to change the way the game is played. Mormonism is like an alternative reality come to
life—a counterfactual history of post-Nicene developments of pre-Nicene theology, the ultimate “what if ” theological parlor game. ... Mormonism invites creedal Christians into a world where everything is slightly but significantly skewed from what they are used to. It is as if you are hearing stories you had never heard before about someone you love and thought you knew perfectly well. Better put, it is as if you had discovered another branch of your family that you did not know existed. For most non-Mormon Christians (I will call them traditional or creedal Christians in this chapter), suspicion of Mormonism runs so high that taking Mormonism seriously requires something like an intellectual if not spiritual conversion. Indeed, part of the problem is that conflict between estranged relatives can be more heated than arguments among strangers. Only a movement so close to traditional Christianity could incite such strong feelings.

Webb offers these thoughts in his chapter on Mormonism in light of his overall thesis concerning divine embodiment. But in addition, he also raises them in light of dialogue between traditional Christianity and Mormonism. So my addition to his questions would be, "What would dialogue between Evangelicals and Mormons be different if Evangelicals allowed the 'rules of the game' to change so that we discussed not only items that fit within the dialogical framework of creedal Christendom, but also the very different framework of Mormonism?"

An attempt at exploring this will be pursued in the upcoming issue of Sacred Tribes Journal where Catholic scholar Frank Beckwith, and Mormon scholar Charles Randall Paul, contribute essays that interact with Webb's thesis on divine embodiment and the contributionof Mormon theology in this regard.

Why Mormons Leave

2012-01-13T13:44:00.003-07:00

John Dehlin of Mormon Stories Podcast has created a new website and Facebook page titled and devoted to the subject of "Why Mormons Leave." In his description of the rationale behind and purpose of this project, Dehlin writes:

I just wanted to let you know that Mormon Stories Podcast and Mormon Stories Podcast Community are embarking on a new initiative to build greater empathy and support for people who choose to leave the LDS church. We think it's going to be important.

I applaud this worthwhile new project and hope that it helps bring understanding and empathy for those making the journey out of Mormonism. Although Why Mormons Leave is done from within Mormon culture, it is an approach in keeping with that of our Transitions resource produced by those outside of by sympathetic to Mormon culture.

At the Crossroads, Again: Mormon & Methodist Encounters in the 19th and 21st Centuries

2011-12-17T11:22:00.005-07:00

The Foundation for Religious Diplomacy is very pleased to announce the second conference hosted by the Mormon Chapter on February 24-5 in Washington DC. The event will be hosted by Wesley Theological Seminary and will be entitled "At the Crossroads, Again: Mormon & Methodist Encounters in the 19th and 21st Centuries." The conference is designed to bring practitioners and scholars from both traditions into a conversation to build understanding, trust, and friendship. Attached you will find the conference announcement with further details. Wehope your schedule allows you to attend.

Scheduled Participants include:

Frances Adeney, Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary
Senator Robert Bennett
David Campbell, University of Notre Dame
Kathleen Flake, Vanderbilt University
Terryl Givens, University of Richmond
Eileen Guenther, Wesley Theological Seminary
Elaine Heath, Southern Methodist University
Matthew Holland, Utah Valley University (President)
David McAllister-Wilson, Wesley Theological Seminary (President)
Warner Woodworth, Brigham Young University
others to be announced

The conference website can be found here.

Links to the 2010 Mormon Engagement with the World Religions Conference

Video Footage
http://religious-diplomacy.org/June2010Conference

Conference Schedule & Information
http://fidweb.org/projects/fid-events/2010/mormonism-and-world-religions

We are also pleased to note that February 2012 will be a banner month for outstanding conferences on Mormonism on the East Coast as more than a few of our FRD Mormon chapter colleagues will be participating in a Columbia University event on Mormonism and politics in early February (http://ircpl.org/2011/event/mormonism-conference). Jana Riess is among the organizers and will be sending more information soon.

2012: Decoding the Countercultural Apocalypse

2011-12-08T08:25:00.003-07:00

2012
Decoding the Countercultural Apocalypse
Edited by: Joseph Gelfer

Description
December 21 2012 is believed to mark the end of the thirteenth B'ak'tun cycle in the Long Count of the Mayan calendar. A growing number of people believe this date to mark the end of the world or, at the very least, the end of the world as we know it: a shift to a new form of global consciousness. 2012: Decoding the Countercultural Apocalypse brings together for the first time a range of scholarly analyses on the 2012 phenomena grounded in various disciplines including religious studies, anthropology, Mayan studies, cultural studies and the social sciences.

2012: Decoding the Countercultural Apocalypse will show readers how much of the 2012 phenomenon is based on the historical record, and how much is contemporary fiction. It will reveal to readers the landscape of the modern apocalyptic imagination, the economics of the spiritual marketplace, the commodification of countercultural values, and the cult of celebrity. This collection brings much-needed academic rigour and documentation to a subject of rapidly increasing interest to diverse religious and other communities in these crucial closing years before we experience what will be either a profound leap in the human story or, less dramatically, just another mark in time.

Contents
Preface
Michael D. Coe, Yale University
1. Introduction
Joseph Gelfer
2. The 2012 Phenomenon: New Uses for an Ancient Mayan Calendar
Robert K. Sitler, Stetson University
3. Maya Prophesies, 2012 and the Problematic Nature of Truth
Mark Van Stone, Southwestern College
4. Mayanism Comes of (New) Age
John W. Hoopes, Kansas University
5. The 2012 Milieu: Hybridity, Diversity and Stigmatised Knowledge
Peter Lentini, Monash University
6. Chichén Itzá and Chicken Little: How Pseudosciences Embraced 2012
Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State University
7. Roland Emmerich’s 2012: A Simple Truth
Andrea Austin, Wilfrid Laurier University
8. The 2012 Movement, Visionary Arts and Psytrance Culture
Graham St John, University of Regina
9. In a Prophetic Voice: Australasia 2012
Joseph Gelfer
10. Approaching 2012: Modern Misconceptions vs. Reconstructing Ancient Maya Perspectives
John Major Jenkins, independent scholar

Reconfiguring Ecclesiology in Participatory Culture

2011-12-05T10:05:00.004-07:00

The more I participate in and study various aspects of contemporary American and Western culture the more I recognize that the church is ill prepared to participate in relevant ways. We need to be asking ourselves why the church is still largely a passive culture, whereas the rest of the society in which we find ourselves is now a participatory culture.

This has dawned on me the more I study things like Burning Man Festival, science fiction festivals, and even with the recent viewing of a documentary on George Lucas which referenced thousands of fan films that wanted to make their contribution to the universe and mythology of Star Wars. Think of YouTube pages, blogging, Twitter, personally created playlists on iTunes, and any number of other technologies we draw upon every day. People want to be active participants in the creation of what matters most to them. Yet church worship services involve coming to a building at a time designated by others, standing when you are told to stand, sitting when you are told to sit, singing songs (and in the styles and forms) chosen by others, and hearing a message crafted by others and then being told what to think about it and how to act on it in your own life.

The church in the 21st century American and Western contexts must be thinking about what it means to reconfigure ecclesiology in participatory culture. Where is this on the agenda of the emerging and missional church movements?

"You're Not a True Muslim:" The Challenge of Religious Understanding and Self-Representation

2011-11-27T16:29:00.005-07:00

This clip is from a talk show with Anderson Cooper where he includes those on the reality show All-American Muslim from the TLC channel. This program follows the lives, joys, and struggles of various Muslim families in America.

One of the interesting facets of this clip is the reaction of a woman in the audience to the guests from the show, and their religion. Several thoughts come to mind that relate not only to American's wresting with Islam, but are equally applicable to other minority religions that are also viewed with suspicion.

First, although the Muslims in the television program define themselves in terms of their religious practices and beliefs, the woman in the audience presumes to know more about their religion, and its "true" representation than the adherents do. Allowing self-representation in religion is crucial.

Second, related to the thought above, there is a frequent problem in the Evangelical subculture about the understanding of a given religion as the only true and right way to understand that religion. Any other representation by adherents is held to be inauthentic and deceptive.

Third, from these it follows that we must recognize diversity in religious traditions, and that these traditions change, develop, and evolve over time. Religious adherents disagree among themselves about how to interpret their tradition, so it seems difficult for outsiders to adjudicate as to which expression within a diverse tradition is the only true one.

Fourth and finally, we must be willing to work through the difficult process of listening to the religious other, and then wresting with our preconceptions in a process of dialogue so as to come to grips with religious diversity and complexity in our religiously plural environment. All-American Muslim seems to be the best type of program to help us wrestle with difficult post-9/11 issues.

Vanguard Trailer on Islamophobia

2011-11-14T10:21:00.001-07:00

I watched this program a few days ago and was pleasantly surprised at its balanced presentation of post-9/11 concerns for Islamic terrorism in the U.S. and UK, balanced by the equally disturbing Islamophobia in the two countries. Such things make a strong case for the need for good religious dialogue programs, such as my work with the Foundation for Religious Diplomacy.

Transitions Bonus Video Part 1: Notes for Church Planters

2011-11-11T19:53:00.004-07:00

Notes for Church Planters from WIIS on Vimeo.

We have finalized the video Bonus Materials for the Transitions project. The first part has been uploaded to Vimeo, which includes thoughts on contextualized church planting in Mormon culture. The second installment will be uploaded next week and will include responses to significant issues for Mormons. Both videos will be part of the Transitions website Preview page.

Guest Essays: Patheos Book Club and Square No More

2011-11-07T18:38:00.003-07:00

I contributed a couple of guest essays for various websites today. First was my piece "Mysticism, Paranormal, and the Super-Story," at the Patheos website on religion, which interacts with issues raised by Jeffrey Kripal's book Mutants & Mystics: Science Fiction, Superhero Comics, and the Paranormal (University of Chicago Press, 2011).

The second piece was a guest post on Phil Wyman's blog Square No More. The post is titled "Who are the Cultural Creatives, and Why Should Evangelicals Care?". The post looks at the significant subcultural movement called Cultural Creatives, a label taken from the book on the topic by Paul Ray and Sherry Ruth Anderson (Three Rivers Press, 2001). The people that comprise this movement are found at Transformation Festivals like Burning Man, and I suggest we have much to learn from them.

Jeffress on Romney and Mormonism: Back to the Future for Evangelicals?

2011-10-13T09:43:00.004-06:00

Last week the race for the Republican presidential nomination briefly resembled the shape it took in 2007. Four years ago it was Mike Huckabee who raised concerns about fellow Republican Mitt Romney’s Mormonism. The same sentiments about Romney’s religion were raised again more recently at a Values Voters Summit sponsored by conservative evangelical organizations. Governor Rick Perry was a speaker at this event where he was introduced by Robert Jeffress, Pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas. Jeffress turned an opportunity for Perry to rally evangelical voters into a national controversy when he used the event to label Mormonism a “cult” and to claim that Romney “is not Christian.”

This is not the first time that evangelical concern over Romney’s Mormonism and allegations of its incompatibility with presidential office has been raised on the national stage. Several months ago Warren Smith made headlines in a piece he wrote for Patheos where he stated that “A Vote for Romney is a Vote for the LDS Church,” a title that echoed that of another evangelical in 2008 who warned then that “a vote for Romney was a vote for Satan.”

In the 1960s Protestant America was concerned about the possibility of a Roman Catholic president in John F. Kennedy. Having navigated that religious hurdle it is clear that other religions are still of great concern, not only for Protestants and other evangelicals, but also many other Americans, particularly when it comes to Mormonism. In a 2007 poll by the Pew Forum 53% of Americans had a favorable view of Mormonism, while 27% viewed the religion negatively. Among Protestants the impressions were slightly more negative, with the positive views at 46%, and the unfavorable ones coming in at 39%. When respondents were asked to summarize Mormonism in a single word, negative ones were offered more than positive, with terms like “polygamy” and “cult” topping the list. These largely negative opinions of Mormonism are all the more striking when they are compared to American opinions about Islam in the same Pew poll. Tellingly, the positive and negative views of Mormonism and Islam are almost identical, even while many in the poll acknowledge they had little awareness of and no personal contact with Mormons or Muslims.

In the wake of the controversy over Pastor Jeffress’ comments about Mormonism we are reminded of the impact of religion on politics, and that many evangelicals have concerns over the religion of presidential candidates, particularly those that find their headquarters in Salt Lake City. But it would be a mistake to think that all of evangelicalism understands the Mormon religion as a cult and seeks to relate to individual Mormons in terms of cultism. Two elements among evangelicals need to be considered, including the mindset of the “younger evangelicals,” as well as those engaged in dialogical approaches.

In 2002 Robert Webber wrote a book titled The Younger Evangelicals: Facing the Challenges of the New World (Baker Books, 2002). In this volume Webber discussed the diversity of Protestant evangelicalism, and developments in this subculture’s religious landscape. He defined “younger evangelicals” to include anyone “who deals thoughtfully with the shift from 20^th- to 21^st-century culture.” Although Webber had primarily generational mindsets in mind, his definition rightly moves beyond age considerations. These shifts involve different attitudes to theology, culture, and other religions.

Some of these differing attitudes are evident in certain evangelical approaches to Mormonism. In 2002 Salt Lake Theological Seminary produced a resource called Bridges, which framed Mormonism as a religious culture with a unique social identity. Although its producers recognized significant theological differences with Mormonism, they discouraged the use of the term “cult” and the corresponding theological category. More recently, this shift in understanding has continued in evangelical publications such as the book Understanding Your Mormon Neighbor (Zondervan, 2011) by Ross Anderson. In the Introduction, Anderson answers the question “Is Mormonism a Cult?.” After noting the association of cultism with groups like Heaven’s Gate and Jonestown in popular media, Anderson states that, “This kind of labeling leads to a narrow, inaccurate view of the LDS people. I believe that Mormonism is theologically in error, but we don’t need to assign a pejorative label to sustain that claim.” Additional examples could be cited, but these illustrate that a new mindset is present within evangelicalism that includes a willingness to consider Mormonism in less pejorative terms, even where substantial theological disagreement is recognized.

In addition to the “younger evangelicals” and their desire to understand Mormonism more in terms of religious culture than cult, there is also an evangelical move that demonstrates more interest in dialogue than denunciation. A number of examples can be cited in this regard. For several years a group of evangelical scholars have been meeting on an annual basis with their Mormon counterparts. The venues for these meetings differ, but relationships have developed and a deeper understanding of their religions has occurred on both sides of the divide. Such dialogue has also taken place on a grassroots level in various places in Utah where small groups of evangelicals and Mormons have met in homes. These meetings began with shared common stories of personal testimonies of faith, and have then progressed to more difficult and in-depth issues of doctrine and practice.

Beyond these dialogical activities, the Foundation for Religious Diplomacy (FRD) also promises to contribute positively to evangelical and Mormon interactions, as well as to America’s broader interreligious environment. Founded by Charles Randall Paul, a Latter-day Saint, FRD describes its efforts as involving “[i]nterreligious diplomacy [that] builds respect and trust between people of integrity who hold opposing religious or ideological beliefs. The goal is not to resolve inevitable differences but to sustain them in peaceful tension by engaging in dialogue that includes sharing personal testimonies and respectful contestation.” FRD has established chapters within various religious traditions so as to help train those within these traditions in more appropriate and effective forms of dialogue. Recently, the Evangelical Chapter was formed as it seeks to involve evangelicals on academic and grassroots levels in dialogue.

American evangelicals have a long way to go in navigating the challenging waters of American pluralism and post-Christendom. For years it was a given that America’s presidential candidates would bring some kind of traditionally Christian background to office. The presence of candidates like Mitt Romney and Jon Huntsman bring a renewed awareness of the diversity of America’s religious landscape, and the implications for the political sphere. Although many evangelicals still bristle at the idea of president from a religion with a long history of conflict with the religious mainstream, a small and growing movement is present within the evangelical subculture that must also be considered for a complete understanding of this significant facet of America’s religious and political landscape.

God's Ghost Busters: When Will Evangelicals Move Beyond Church Lady Approaches to Halloween and the Paranormal?

2011-10-12T20:46:00.009-06:00

The Halloween season is upon us, and while many are enjoying this time of festive celebration with its ghosts and goblins, not everyone finds pleasure in such things. It is not uncommon for Protestant evangelicals and fundamentalists to express grave concern over the alleged dangers of the holiday itself, as well as the various elements associated with it. Many times books are released touching on evangelical concerns related to this time of year, and thanks to The Wild Hunt I was recently made aware of the 2011 contribution to this evangelical phenomenon.

God's Ghostbusters: Vampires? Ghosts? Aliens? Werewolves? Creatures of the Night Beware! (Defender Publishing LLC, 2011) was published last month, just in time for the multi-author contributors of this volume to register their concern about all things horrific. Much can be learned about the perspective and background of this book by considering the product description (with additional insights provided by this YouTube clip):

Recently some 300 exorcists flocked to Poland for a week-long congress to examine the current fashion for vampirism the world-over and the apparent connection between this fascination and a surge in demonic possession.

This comes as the world is experiencing an explosion of ancient occultism combined with wicked fascination for ghosts and all things paranormal. In the United States alone, there are now more than two hundred thousand registered witches and as many as 8 million unregistered practitioners of “the craft.” On college and high school campuses, vampires, werewolves, and other “creatures of the night” are esteemed as objects of desire and idolized by young men and women who view them as cult icons of envious mystical power. Church goers are enchanted by the darkness as well. An April 13, 2011 article “Mysticism Infecting Nazarene Beliefs” was preceded only a few days before by a Telegraph article describing how a “surge in Satanism” inside the church has sparked a “rise in demand for exorcists” within traditional religious settings.”

If readers are looking for an analysis of horror in popular culture, as well as various aspects of Western esotericism, and the paranormal, coupled with academic theological analysis, this is not the volume in which such things can be found. (Many of the weaknesses of other evangelical books on this topic apply to this volume as well.) The contributors are obviously out of their depth in addressing the subject matter with competency. A few examples of this include the fact that statistics are provided that cannot be substantiated and which confirms the worst fears of evangelicals regarding certain minority religions. The volume also gives no indication of awareness of sound demographic studies on Paganism, minority religions and identity groups, or the paranormal. It also continues to connect various minority religious traditions, as well as the paranormal, with Satanism, demonstrating a misunderstanding of Satanism, as well as the paranormal and minority religions themselves.

What this volume actually does is tell us more about the contributors, their audience, and the sociophobics of the religious other within the evangelical subculture than it does about Western esotericism, minority religions, or the paranormal. In reflecting on this volume I couldn't help but be reminded of Dana Carvey's Church Lady character on Saturday Night Live. This character makes audiences laugh because of not only the confirmation of stereotypes, but also because of the one-dimensional nature of her concerns about the culture around her where Satan is behind every alleged transgression. In the same way the theological analysis of this volume is thin and simplistic, trotting out a well-worn dualism, with satanic forces seemingly far more powerful and present than the divine.

I hope that one Halloween season evangelicals will demonstrate a willingness to stop bearing false witness against their neighbors involved in various facets of popular occulture, and that they move beyond a response worthy of the Church Lady.

Related posts:

"Interview with the authors of Paranormal America"

"Wicca as America's Third Largest Religion?: Unfortunate Evangelical Sensationalism"

"Summary Thoughts: New Book Generation Hex"

Space.com: Are Aliens Part of God's Plan Too?

2011-10-03T09:07:00.003-06:00

Space.com includes an essay with the intriguing title "Are Alien's Part of God's Plan Too?: Finding E.T. Could Change Religion Forever." The essay mentions a gathering of "Christian thinkers" at the 100 Year Starship Symposium that considered the ramifications of intergalactic travel. As one of the participants put it in regards to the theological aspects of the symposium:

In other words, "Did Jesus die for Klingons too?" as philosophy professor Christian Weidemannof Germany's Ruhr-University Bochum titled his talk at a panel on the philosophical and religious considerations of visiting other worlds.

This issue is a pressing one for theologians who interact with contemporary cosmology and astronomy, and it presents challenges not only to assumptions about life on earth and its relation to the divine, but also about soteriology and incarnation.

See the previous post of mine on "An Astrotheology of Extraterrestrial Life" and a presentation by theologian Ted Peters on the issue that relates to this topic.

Jeet-Kei Leung: Burning Man and Transformational Festivals

2011-10-02T12:06:00.006-06:00

The Wild Hunt blog recently posted on the video above: Jason Pitzl-Waters wrote:

The TEDx Youtube channel recently uploaded a talk by Jeet Kei Leung from TEDxVancouver 2010 on transformational festivals. The half-hour presentation focuses on West Coast-oriented festivals and events like Faerieworlds and Burning Man and talks about how these events re-merge spiritual/religious practices with secular festival culture.

As Jason offers his commentary on Leung's work he also connects this idea of transformational festivals to Dragon*Con, a fascinating idea which has merit as I've noted in the religious elements in the Star Trek subculture and in my past posts elsewhere (see below) on the similarities between Burning Man Festival and Dragon*Con.

Near the end of Leung's analysis he summarizes some of the key elements in these festivals. His mention of co-creation in participation, and returning a sense of mythos are especially significant for those in Western Christendom with ears to hears the winds of change among the cultural creatives.

I'm glad to see others picking up on the spiritual and religious significance of these events, and I'm looking forward to Leung's book.

See my related posts "Star Trek as a Religious Phenomenon," "Star Trek Conventions as Sacred Pilgrimage," and "Fan Culture Documentaries: Back to Space-Con, and Four Days at Dragon*Con."

Books on Demand: Burning Man Festival Book

2011-09-23T22:16:00.007-06:00

Books on Demand now includes a listing for the forthcoming book version of my MA thesis on Burning Man Festival. Please take a look at the page, and consider posting it on your Facebook profile and Twitter if to promote research in Burning Man studies and religion and pop culture.

Burning Man Festival: A Life Enhancing, Post-Christendom, "Middle Way"

flap text of the book
Burning Man Festival is an intentional community and alternative cultural event involving 50,000 people that meet annually in the desert of Nevada. Scholarly analysis of the festival tends to interpret it through Victor Turner’s framework of liminality and ritual. While this perspective sheds valuable light on understanding the event, other theoretical frameworks are helpful, including the “homeless mind” and secondary institutions thesis of Peter Berger, Brigitte Berger, and Hansfried Kellner used to explain the 1960s counterculture, updated by Paul Heelas and Linda Woodhead to include the turn to the self now involving life-enhancing secondary institutions. Hakim Bey’s Temporary Autonomous Zone also presents promising interpretive options for understanding this event. From these perspectives, Burning Man may be understood as an alternative cultural event that functions as a secondary institution and new spiritual outlet in rejection of mainstream institutions and religion.

LAP Lambert Academic Publishing
ISBN 978-3-8454-7517-2, paperback, 88 Pages

The book is also available via Amazon.com.

Foundation for Religious Diplomacy Announces Launch of Evangelical Chapter

2011-09-22T20:48:00.003-06:00

For Immediate Release
18 September 2011

Foundation for Religious Diplomacy Announces Launch of Evangelical Chapter

Background
Evangelical Christians have been part of the history of religious dialogue in various contexts, including ecumenical dialogue with representatives of the branches of Christendom beyond Protestantism, as well as with world religions such as Buddhism and Islam, and more recently, the new religious movements, including Mormonism and Neo-Paganism. But among many Evangelicals dialogue has a negative reputation. It is often equated with liberalism, and as a result, to suggest that dialogue has a place among Evangelical engagement with the religions is suspect.

But in our increasingly pluralistic, post-9/11 world, religion has often contributed to social and religious tensions, and at times, even conflict. In light of this troubling scenario appropriate forms of dialogue would seem to be an important tool for not only evangelism, but also understanding and work toward peace and justice.

Yet despite the great need for dialogue, many Evangelicals are unprepared for such efforts. What type of approach is appropriate? Many groups and diplomatic strategies employ conventions that emphasize commonalities between groups and advocate “tolerance” of differences between them. The Foundation for Religious Diplomacy (FRD) claims that this is not enough – and, in fact, may work against the interests of peace.

“Merely ‘tolerating’ others can be a sign of disrespect that leads to resentment – or worse. When people feel they cannot express their most cherished beliefs in a respectful hearing, they will often disassociate from their social group,” claims Randall Paul, president of FRD. “It is vital that we provide opportunities for every one who holds strong convictions about truth or the best prescription for living well to fully share those in legitimate ways.”

According to Terry Muck, board member for FRD and Evangelical Chapter member, “Our position is that rather than discouraging this type of missional activity through dialogue, we should be about helping religious groups do their advocacy in the context of peaceful, respectful conversation and dialogue with others who are similarly committed to promoting their religious commitments.”

People with deep religious convictions believe they serve the world best by expressing their truth claims honestly and completely. Discouraging this expression in the interest of cooperation is often counterproductive to building trust between people who deeply disagree. FRD recognizes that differences and tensions can be healthy for a family, a community, or a society if people can express their deepest convictions forthrightly and without anger. This can best happen in face to face encounters with careful listening and mutual sharing of convictions and experiences.

In order to facilitate an appropriate form of dialogue that does justice to the real differences among religious traditions, and to do so in ways that are respectful, the Evangelical Chapter of the Foundation for Interreligious Diplomacy will work to develop “bi-lingual” members of the chapter through programs and activities to dialogue with particular religious groups that want to engage more deeply with Evangelical Christianity.

Evangelical Chapter Statement of Purpose
The purpose of the Evangelical Chapter is to promote opportunities for education about dialogue between Evangelical Christians, and then to promote such dialogue in various forums between Evangelicals and members of other religious communities.

* * *

Director

John W. Morehead is Director of the Western Institute for Intercultural Studies. He is co-editor and contributing author for Encountering New Religious Movements: A Holistic Evangelical Approach. He is also the editor of Beyond the Burning Times: A Pagan and Christian in Dialogue, and co-founder and editor of Sacred Tribes Journal. John also provides expertise to the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization issue group on “The Church and the New Spiritualities.” He has been involved in interreligious dialogue in the contexts of Islam, Mormonism, and Paganism.

Chapter Members

Michael T. Cooper is associate professor of Religion and Contemporary Culture and director of the MA in Cultural Engagement at Trinity Graduate School in Deerfield, Illinois. Dr. Cooper has contributed numerous articles and chapters dealing with the revival of Pagan religions in the West and has presented conference papers on the subject at London School of Economics, University of Bordeaux, San Diego State University as well as others. He is the author of Contemporary Druidry: A Historic and Ethnographic Study (2010) and editor of Perspectives on Post-Christendom Spiritualities: Evangelical Reflections on New Religious Movements and Western Spiritualities (2010). He is a senior editor of Sacred Tribes Journal, research fellow at the Western Institute of Intercultural Studies, and founder of the Timothy Center for Sustainable Transformation.

Gerald McDermott is Jordan-Trexler Professor of Religion and Philosophy at Roanoke College and Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Baylor Institute for Studies of Religion. An ordained Anglican priest, he serves as Teaching Pastor at St. John Lutheran Church in Roanoke. McDermott’s most recent books are The Oxford Handbook of Evangelical Theology; (with Michael McClymond) The Theology of Jonathan Edwards (Oxford University Press); God’s Rivals: Why God Permits Different Religions—Insights From The Bible And The Early Church (IVP); Mormons and Evangelicals: Exploring the Boundaries (Regent College Publishing), co-authored with Brigham Young University theologian Robert Millet; and World Religions: An Indispensable Guide (Thomas Nelson).

Terry C. Muck is dean of the E. Stanley Jones School of World Mission and Evangelism at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Kentucky. He is the author of nine books, including Ministry and Theology in Global Perspective: Contemporary Challenges for the Church, and Christianity Encountering World Religions, co-authored with Frances Adeney.

Bob Robinson is Senior Lecturer at Laidlaw College in New Zealand, and its associated Laidlaw-Carey Graduate School of Theology. He holds the MA from the University of Canterbury, and the PhD in Systematic Theology from the University of London. He worked in Singapore for a number of years before completing his doctoral dissertation: a Christological analysis of the recent Christian-Hindu encounter now published as Christians Meeting Hindus: an Analysis and Theological Critique of the Hindu-Christian Encounter in India (Carlisle, UK: Paternoster Press, 2004). He speaks and lectures widely on issues related to the constructive defense of the uniqueness and finality of Christ and advocates the incarnational and dialogical way of Jesus as the best way of reaching out to the new spiritualities.

Loren Wilkinson joined the Regent College faculty in 1981. He has written many scholarly and popular articles developing a Christian environmental ethic and exploring the human relationship to the natural world in its environmental, aesthetic, scientific and religious dimensions. Loren’s teaching interests include Christianity and the Arts, Philosophy, Earthkeeping and his popular “Creation, Wilderness and Technology” course that takes place on a summer boat trip. His books include Earthkeeping: Christian Stewardship of Natural Resources and Caring for Creation in Your Own Backyard (co-authored with Mary Ruth Wilkinson). He is currently working on a book entitled Circles and the Cross: A Trinitarian Response to Some Contemporary Religious Movements.

Questions concerning the Evangelical Chapter of the Foundation for Religious Diplomacy (http://www.fidweb.org) can be directed to John Morehead, chapter director, at johnwmorehead@msn.com.

Reflections on "Faith and Doubt at Ground Zero"

2011-09-09T21:39:00.003-06:00

Watch the full episode. See more FRONTLINE.

This week I caught the majority of a rerun of a special edition of Frontline, Faith and Doubt at Ground Zero on PBS that looks at 9/11s impact on people of faith. If you haven't seen this, it is an amazing, emotional, and thought provoking program that made me think of my work in religious studies and dialogue.

First, there is the story of a Lutheran minister in the program where he shares his experiences after praying and participating in a multifaith memorial service in New York on Sep. 23, 2011. Unfortunately, after participating in this memorial in pastoral fashion, the minister received hate mail from his own denominational members accusing him of not only heresy, but also of being a terrorist attacking the faith he is sworn to protect. This is a reminder of the challenges the Evangelical community faces in a pluralistic environment where pastoral and dialogical issues arise concerning those of other religions.

Second, there is a comment by a rabbi that was spot on. He stated that some have looked at those who engaged in the terrorism of 9/11 and said that this is not true Islam, while others have said it is the only true expression of Islam. The rabbi feels that this is misguided. He says that the terrorists of 9/11 tapped into something in their tradition that motivated the attacks, just as members of other religions have tapped into aspects of their religious traditions as justification for violence. In his view we have to acknowledge the dark side of religion which can be both a great and motivating power for good as well as for evil. Not do to this, in the rabbi's view, is to sanitize our religions inappropriately.

Third and finally, watching this program it made me realize even more that dialogue certainly includes elements of persuasion and proselytization, but these should not be the only (or perhaps even the primary) reason for engaging in dialogue. With the world in need of understanding, peace and justice post-9/11, dialogue has far greater potential beyond our ability to persuade the other toward conversion. Unfortunately, when they are willing to consider dialogue as something beyond taboo, many Evangelicals view it as little more than another form of proclamation and evangelism, and miss out on greater opportunities for what this form of communication and relationships can achieve.

Reflections on Injustice: Dan Stidham and the West Memphis Three Case

2011-08-26T20:00:00.009-06:00

Morehead's Musings: Mr. Stidham, thank you for your willingness to do a follow up interview on the West Memphis Three case (previous interview here) in light of last week's surprising release of Damien Nichols, Jessie Misskelley, and Jason Baldwin. Before we move to questions related to an update on the case, can you comment on your legal work since you served as defense attorney for one of the defendants, and how you have stayed involved as this case developed over the years?

Dan Stidham: I served as Jessie Misskelley’s court-appointed trial counsel, and was involved in all of his appeals up until 2008. At that time I became a full-time State District Court Judge here in Arkansas, and could no longer serve as counsel for Mr. Misskelley. In addition, I had become a witness in the case with regard to the Rule 37 appeals for both Mr. Misskelley and Mr. Baldwin. I could not be a lawyer, a judge and/or a witness in his case all at the same time. After 2008, I continued to serve as an “unofficial” advocate for all of the West Memphis Three and the fight for their freedom. I often referred to myself as the “Cheerleader” after that time. The Rule 37 hearings lasted on and off for two years.

After the trial ended in 1994, I made a promise to Jessie that I would continue to fight for him for as long as it took to get him released for a crime that he did not commit and correct this injustice. After 18 years and 78 days, I was finally able to fulfill that promise a week ago and it was an awful good feeling I must say to be in the Courtroom watching it unfold. I would have gladly spent another 18 years if that would have been necessary, but I am glad that they are now finally free.

Morehead's Musings: Since the original conviction a number of interesting developments occurred over the years, such as new DNA evidence. Can you sketch some of this, and how it seemed to strengthen the case for the innocence of the WM3 rather than the State of Arkansas?

Dan Stidham: During the latter stage of the appeals and the quest for new trials for the WM3, the defense team was never charged with proving that any particular individual or individuals were actually responsible for the crimes, though that would have been a huge bonus and made it even easier and more clear that the WM3 were not responsible for the deaths of the three eight-year-old kids. Through the use of the best forensic technology and experts available including DNA analysis, the defense was able to demonstrate that no reasonable jury would convict these kids in the event a new trial be granted. Of course, the State fought us “tooth and nail” for many years before an agreement for testing the evidence was reached. There were several DNA profiles taken from biological material found at the crime scene and on the bodies, but not once did any of it point back to, get linked or relate to, in any form or fashion, the WM3. DNA in a hair found in one of the ligatures used to bind one of the victims was found to match Terry Hobbs who is victim Stevie Branch’s father. Another DNA match was discovered on a tree stump where the bodies were found which belonged to David Jacoby who was with Terry Hobbs on the day of the murder. There is also a partial DNA sample that was taken from one of the penile swabs done at autopsy that does not have enough genetic markers to definitively state that it belongs to any particular individual as compared to the rest of the population, but there was enough markers to exclude all known samples in the case including all three convicted men. Just in the past two weeks, two other “foreign” DNA samples were discovered on some shoelaces that do not match any known samples in the case again excluding the WM3.

Also, witnesses began to recant their 1993 and 1994 statements and defense investigators uncovered additional new evidence that lead to the inescapable conclusion that these kids were absolutely innocent. The legal team continued to expand to include lawyers from all over the country, and none of us, including the celebrity donors, were going to let this injustice stand. Then suddenly the media finally realized that the nonsensical drama that was presented in court in 1994 to obtain the convictions against the WM3 was not what they had been told it was, and what was left of the State’s case completely unraveled.

The prosecution’s theory was that the case was a Satanic Ritualistic Homicide. The problem with this is that just like the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy, there is no such thing as a Satanic Ritualistic Homicide. The FBI’s own Ken Lanning has never been able to document a single case of Satanic Ritualistic Homicide anywhere on the planet. Similar studies in the UK have revealed the same thing. Thus, as it became more and more apparent that there were going to be new trials in the case, the state was going to have to use the only evidence that they had left which was Misskelley’s Satanic Ritualistic Homicide false confession. Some of your readers will point to other statements Misskelley said, or may have made, subsequent to the trials Misskelley is so mentally handicapped, he would say or admit to anything. I know this because I have been the only person on the case who has watched this unfold over the course of the past 18 years. I could get him today to admit to killing JFK in Dallas in 20 minutes or less and he wasn’t even born yet in 1963. He and I could sit down and solve every “unsolved” murder in the country if people were still willing to believe in false confessions. Those who use Misskelley’s false confession as evidence of guilt for the WM3 simply do not understand the dynamics or the psychology of interrogations and false confessions. If they themselves were ever submitted to the same mental torture that Misskelley endured then they would immediately understand. Another example of a coerced confession would be any one of our pilots who are interrogated and forced to give false confessions even though they are trained on how not to do this. No human can withstand mental torture for very long, especially someone who is mentally handicapped.

Frankly, “Yea,” “Uh-huh,” and “Okay” are not words consistent with a real confession. This is what you find in the Misskelley statements. Police officers today are trained not to ask leading questions and look for information from suspects that only that only someone who was actually at a crime scene would actually know about. Police and Prosecutors (for the most part) today understand these dynamics and no reasonably intelligent police officer or prosecutor today would even file charges based on such ridiculous evidence, much less accept Misskelley’s statements as either accurate, or as an indication of guilt.

In 1993 and 1994, very few people in the world understood the concept of false confessions. One of the three who did, was with me in the courtroom at the Misskelley trial and Judge Burnett refused to allow him to testify or qualify him as an expert. Ironically, two weeks later in the Echols-Baldwin trial, he allowed a so-called expert in the occult to testify despite the fact that he had an illegitimate mail order PhD from a diploma mill to allow prosecutors to present evidence of a Satanic Ritualistic Homicide, again a phenomenon that simply doesn’t exist. Simply put, the judge allowed junk science to be injected into the trial and scientifically reliable evidence to be excluded.

“Satanic Panic” convicted the WM3 and the hard work of many people from all around the world refused to let this injustice stand. To try and get a conviction, the State would have had to overcome the best experts and lawyers in the world, and try to prove the first ever Satanic Ritualistic Homicide in the world. No small task I can assure you. The new experts stated that what police and prosecutors thought was sexual mutilation in 1993 was actually post-mortem animal predation.

Morehead's Musings: Observers, particularly those who have followed the WM3 case for years, were stunned last week when it was learned that a meeting in court was scheduled involving the defendants, their families, and legal authorities in Arkansas. Speculation then followed that some kind of deal was in the works, and to everyone's great surprise the WM3 were freed. How did this deal come about?

Dan Stidham: I wasn’t in the room when the plea deal was reached, however, Mara Leveritt reported the exact details of how it happened in the Arkansas Times recently. I defer to her on this issue. I will say that the State of Arkansas, obviously, really wanted this case to go away, and the WM3 wanted to be out of prison for something that they did not do, especially Damien Echols who had been on death row and solitary confinement for over ten years. A rarely used legal doctrine allowed both sides to accomplish their goals, thus ending a case that could have gone on for even more years.

Morehead's Musings: I watched the press conference with Prosecutor Scott Ellington after the announcement that the WM3 were being released, and the deal seemed curious if not contradictory to an outside observer. On the one hand the state had the WM3 admit guilt yet allowed them to maintain their innocence. They also had to agree not to bring civil suit against the State. And when reporters asked in follow up about whether the State still thought the WM3 were guilty, the response was yes, but that the hope was that the three had been rehabilitated. As someone who is familiar with this case, but with no legal background, it seems to me that the State wanted to cover itself legally and politically, while also getting out of an increasingly difficult case from a public relations perspective. Is this view off base? What are your thoughts?

Dan Stidham: There should be no politics in justice, no where, no how, but your view and the reports in the media seem to indicate that “this view” could possibly be on base. I will say that I was proud of the courage the Arkansas Supreme Court displayed for remanding the case back to the trial Court because former Judge, now State Senator, David Burnett earlier had refused to even consider the new and overwhelming evidence in the case in earlier hearings. This was about a two year process as I recall do conduct this appeal.

I also think that despite the allegations of “politics” being invoked by some people in the case, issues I cannot address personally, Prosecutor Scott Ellington has shown considerable courage in agreeing to the “Alford” plea. He deserves great credit for this decision, demonstrated an ability to make tough decisions, and has taken considerable heat over this which I believe is quite unfair. He simply doesn’t deserve it. After all, this case is a case he inherited just last year and he made none of the original decisions that were made in the case back in 1993 and 1994.

Mr. Ellington announced on Thursday that despite the fact that he considers the case “closed” he would consider any new evidence brought to him and would prosecute the real killers if adequate proof was presented to him. Again, quite a courageous move on his part. Also, Governor Beebe recently publicly stated that he would pardon the WM3 if the real killers were discovered. I applaud the Governor’s position in this regard, as it is the right thing to do.

Judge David Laser also deserves credit for his leadership in taking on the issues in this case and accepting the plea that freed the WM3. It was clear to me that he took considerable time and in reviewing the overwhelming amount of evidence in the case. Had the “Alford Plea” not been entered, I truly believe he would have taken the courageous step of granting new trials for the WM3. But this would have meant more time for the Defendants behind bars and perhaps more countless appeals, etc.

These victim’s families deserve better than they got from the WMPD and they deserve closure. I will personally continue to work on this case and others have also pledged their continued support to find the real killers as well. This “Alford Plea” was by no means perfect justice, but it is justice, nonetheless. A man is off death row and three innocent persons who have spent half their lives in prison for something they didn’t do are free at last.

Morehead's Musings: For me this case was a reminder that legal evidence is never interpreted in a vacuum. Some have recently written on this case in connection with "cognitive bias." What part might negative stereotypes of heavy metal music, the Goth subculture, minority religions like Wicca, and fears over the occult have played in how evidence and the defendants were interpreted?

Dan Stidham: Negative stereotypes played a huge role in the case. In fact, I was invited yesterday to write a law review article on that very subject. We in the criminal justice system must be very careful not to let fear, prejudice, bias, and culture, or sub-culture issues interfere with our ability to interpret facts and evidence. Just as there should be no politics injected into our criminal justice system, there is no room for stereotypes of any kind there as well. It can lead to injustice, something that I personally cannot tolerate in any form or fashion. The goal of our criminal justice system is truth and justice and to allow fear and panic to rule the day is wrong and it erodes public confidence in our criminal justice system. There is a reason that the statue, and icon of justice, “Lady Justice” has a blindfold on.

Morehead's Musings: What lessons would you like people to take away from the tragic experiences of the WM3 in this case?

Dan Stidham: Wow. There are so many. First of all, that sometimes things are not always as they first appear. That we should never let anything like this happen again to anybody and that there are a myriad of things that we can do to prevent them from happening, and we should be doing them all right now.

Let’s not let fear and prejudice be invoked into any criminal trial. Let us demand that our Courts and legislatures mandate that all interrogations be recorded from beginning to end so that we can see what really happens in the interrogation room. This protects the police as well as the defendant.

If we are not going to let polygraph evidence to be introduced into evidence in Court, then let’s stop letting the police use it as a “tool” to extract false confessions from people, especially the mentally handicapped. The first vote from the jury in the Misskelley trial was 7-5. Mr. Crow and I had convinced 5 of 12 jurors that there was “reasonable doubt” in the case. Imagine what the turnout might have been had the jury been allowed to hear Dr. Richard Ofshe (who has a real PhD and a Pulitzer Prize) testify about the nature of the false confession….and hear Warren Holmes testify that Misskelley had actually passed the polygraph test that the WMPD told him that he had “flunked” and that he was “lying his ass off.” It might have saved him, Mr. Echols and Mr. Baldwin, from 18 years and 78 days that can never be restored back to them.

Interestingly, in 1993 only Minnesota and Alaska required full recording of all confessions in felony cases. Today, 17 States require it either through Court mandate or legislative mandate. We must all work together to get this number up to all 50 States. We are making progress. We must continue to find ways to improve our criminal justice system that is already the best the world has to offer. But we make mistakes sometimes and we must never let our ego keep us from correcting these mistakes.

We must also not forget all the other wrongfully convicted defendants, some of which who are now on death row and who didn’t have the luxury of HBO documentaries and major donors to assist them with their appeals. Even the most casual observer can look at the Innocence Project’s website and see that the number of exonerations due to DNA evidence is skyrocketing. Faulty eye witness testimony, false confessions, prosecutorial misconduct, and junk science like hair and fiber comparisons which can mislead juries are at blame. With the number of these cases, we know there are other innocents out there some of which who are death row and some of which who have already been executed for crimes that they did not commit.

Lastly, a lesson I would like people to take away from this case is the power of prayer and the power of never giving up. Winston Churchill once said: “Never, never, never, give up.” We didn’t and we prevailed. There were many dark days over the course of the past 18 years and every time I got down or depressed, I would get and email or a letter from someone on, or the other side of the planet thanking me for standing by my client and not giving up. I would like to thank each and every one of these folks who contacted me, encouraged me and sustained me in those darkest days. They truly inspired me and kept me going forward.

Morehead's Musings: Since your work with the WM3 you have developed a speaking program where you touch on things like false confessions and satanic panics. Can you tell readers a little about your seminar work and how they might get in touch to schedule you for their event?

Dan Stidham: I have been speaking about the case on college campuses and at professional seminars around the country for the past 18 years talking about this particular injustice and the ways that we can prevent cases like this from happening again. Fortunately, I get to add a few more slides and a happy ending to my power point presentation. I hope to keep getting invited to speak about the case even though the case is now over so that the next generation of lawyers, judges, prosecutors and police officers can learn from the mistakes of the West Memphis case and what we can do to improve our system of justice. The WM3 case has already become an icon for injustice in America and hopefully the invitations will keep coming my way. I really enjoy speaking about the case.

Information about my public speaking program, which I am in the process of up-dating can be found at www.danstidham.com.

I have also decided to write a book about my experiences in the case. I have been kicking around the idea for years but until now I could never decide if I really wanted to re-live the pain of the past. Now that this pain has been strongly mitigated by the freedom of the WM3 it made my decision both easier and obvious. I plan to get started this weekend. The truth of what happened and why it happened must be told. I also think it might be therapeutic for me personally to write this book.

Morehead's Musings: Mr. Stidham, thank you so much for your ongoing work on behalf of the WM3.

Dan Stidham: Thank you for your kind and generous words and the opportunity to follow up with our earlier discussion for your readers. I would be remiss if I didn’t take the opportunity to thank a couple of people without which the freedom of the WM3 would not have been possible. If I tried to name everyone, there is always the danger of leaving someone out as there are so many folks who worked for so many years on this case. Despite the danger, let me acknowledge a few folks like John Phillipsborn, who is without a doubt the best lawyer I have ever encountered. Bruce Sinofsky and Joe Berlinger who first brought this case to the attention of the world through their HBO documentaries and to the attention of people like Eddie Vedder, Natalie Maines, and Johnny Depp who along with countless others donated money to fund the defense and particularly the DNA testing. Eddie Vedder is perhaps the most incredible and generous individual that I have ever met.

Of course, Lori Davis and Mara Leveritt’s work was instrumental. Peter Jackson and his partner Fran Walsh also donated funding for the case. Obviously, their generosity helped tremendously to bring about justice in this case. My many thanks, and best wishes to them for their support.

Old friends like Grove Pashley, Burk Sauls, Kathy Bakken and Lisa Fancher also had a huge impact on this case along with new friends like Amy Berg who is working on a documentary on the case.

I would also like to take time to thank my children who let their Dad miss a few ballgames and other things while they were young so I could keep this case alive long enough for help to arrive. And when the cavalry arrived, did they ever! Also my parents deserve credit for instilling in me the qualities I needed to do my work on this case and live my life. My family was as proud of what happened on Friday as I was. Thanks.

Transitions completed

2011-08-22T09:51:00.010-06:00

Readers may recall my previous post regarding my work on Transitions, an resource designed for those who have made the decision to migrate out of Mormonism and into traditional Christianity. I am pleased to announce that the video and workbook are the first three chapters are available for viewing on Vimeo.

Transitions : the Mormon migration from religion to relationship - PART 1 from WIIS on Vimeo.

Transitions Part 2 - Relationships from WIIS on Vimeo.

Transitions Part 3 - Church Culture from WIIS on Vimeo.

For more information on Transitions see the website at www.LDStransitions.com.

We are holding the first seminar related to this resource titled "Using Transitions in Congregations," September 17 from 8:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. The seminary is free and is for pastors and other coaching people to assist others using Transitions as a tool for former Mormon immigrants. This event will be held at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, 8575 South 700 East in Sandy. Email James@gslc.net for a flyer with more information and to pre-register.

West Memphis Three Freed!

2011-08-19T20:15:00.007-06:00

In the past I have discussed the tragic case of the three young men known as the West Memphis Three who were convicted and imprisoned for eighteen years for allegedly engaging in a satanic or occult crime on three boys in Arkansas. This link includes my analysis, and this one is an interview with Dan Stidham, the defense attorney for one of the men.

Although the evidence against them years ago was weak to non-existent, and later DNA evidence failed to link them to the crime (even pointing toward another individual), the legal system and politicians in Arkansas seemed content to refuse to reconsider the case. The, seemingly out of the blue, a meeting was called involving the young men, their families, and the legal system. Today, we watched with a mixture of amazement, shock, and happiness, as the men were released after a plea deal was agreed to. The deal makes no sense in that the three had to plead guilty, and yet were allowed to maintain their innocence while recognizing the court had sufficient evidence to convict them at a new trial. They are also barred from filing a civil suit against the state. This strange plea deal seems aimed less at justice and fairness in the case, and more toward the Arkansas legal and political system saving face and covering their asses as the conviction and sense of injustice became an international incident.

As we rejoice over the freedom of the West Memphis Three this is time to remember that facts and evidence are not interpreted in a vacuum, but take their meaning and plausibility in social and cultural contexts. When this is tainted by satanic panic it can have dire consequences.

For those interested in learning more about this case see the book Devil's Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three by Mara Leveritt (Atria Books, 2003)), and the documentaries Paradise Lost and Paradise Lost 2.

Krista Tippet On Being: The Civil Conversation Project

2011-08-18T08:41:00.004-06:00

The new email for Krista Tippet's On Being program focuses on The Civil Conversations Project. The email describes the project in this way:

Restoring Political Civility
Conservative Christian voices are prominent in our most heated debates. Evangelical educator Richard Mouw has wisdom on navigating fear, and the temptation it brings to distort the truth about those we see as enemies. This is part of the Civil Conversations Project — ideas and tools for healing our fractured civic spaces.

How Do We Live and Honor Each Other Despite Our Differences?

Tippet goes on to interview Mouw which includes some interesting exchanges on this much-needed subject matter. After quoting a passage from of the Old Testament prophet Jeremiah on seeking the Shalom, the peace of others, Mouw elaborates:

And how do we look at what was in that context, you know? Hebrew people in exile trying to figure out how in the world they're going to relate to a pagan culture. And then God says, seek their Shalom, seek their well-being, you know, even if you disagree radically with them. And then in the New Testament, the Apostle Peter says that we have to honor all human beings and have a regard for their well-being. I take those to be sort of different ways of getting at a very common Biblical theme. What does it mean for me to honor the Muslim, to honor the Mormon, to honor people of unbelief who are hostile toward Christianity? What does it mean to honor them? And then I think we need to work at the theology there, you know. How do we view other people?

The transcript of this interview is worth considering, as are the merits of The Civil Conversations Project, which has implications beyond interreligious conversations and relationships.

Sacred Tribes Journal, Stephen Webb, Mormonism, and Christian Materialism

2011-08-15T11:40:00.004-06:00

The next issue of Sacred Tribes Journal due out later this year will focus on neglected issues of dialogue between Latter-day Saints and traditional Christians. A major facet of this issue will interact with Stephen H. Webb.Webb's forthcoming book on divine embodiment. Webb did his PhD at the University of Chicago, and he teaches in religion and philosophy at Wabash College. He has written on various topics, including Mormonism, where he came across Robert Millet and Gerald McDermott's dialogue book Claiming Christ, found the interaction and subject matter intriguing, and wrote a piece for Reviews in Religion and Theology.

As an outgrowth of this, Webb has written Jesus Christ, Eternal God: Heavenly Flesh and the Metaphysics of Matter (Oxford University Press, November 2011), where he argues that traditional Christians can learn from Mormonism regarding the notion of divine embodiment. Indeed, he goes so far as to argue for a traditional Christian notion of God's materiality, and that orthodox Christian theology needs to reflect further on this topic. Here is a description of the book provided by Webb:

If modern physics teaches us that matter is more mysterious than people used to think, could the spiritual be more material than theologians ever imagined? This book conceptualizes matter and spirit not as opposites or even contraries but as the very stuff of the eternal Jesus Christ. The result is a Christian materialism based on a new metaphysical interpretation of the incarnation. Webb provides an audacious revision of some of the deepest layers of Christian common sense with the goal of constructing a more metaphysically sound orthodoxy. Taking matter as a perfection (or predicate) of the divine requires a rethinking of the immateriality of God, the doctrine of creation out of nothing, the Chalcedonian formula of the person of Christ, and the analogical nature of religious language. It also requires a careful reconsideration of Augustine’s appropriation of the Neo-Platonic understanding of divine incorporeality as well as Origen’s rejection of anthropomorphism. Webb locates his position in contrast to evolutionary theories of emergent materialism and the popular idea that the world is God’s body. He draws on a little known theological position known as the “heavenly flesh” Christology, investigates the many misunderstandings of its origins and its relation to the Monophysite movement, and supplements it with retrievals of Duns Scotus, Caspar Scwenckfeld and Eastern Orthodox reflections on the transfiguration. Also included are discussions of classical figures like Barth and Aquinas as well as more recent theological proposals from Bruce McCormack, David Hart, and Colin Gunton. Perhaps most provocatively, the book argues that Mormonism provides the most challenging, urgent, and potentially rewarding source for metaphysical renewal today.

Francis Beckwith at Baylor University, a Roman Catholic scholar, and Charles Randall Paul of the Foundation for Religious Diplomacy, a Mormon scholar, have agreed to review Webb's book and responsive and interactive essays. Other essays, and a book review of Joseph Smith, Jesus, and Satanic Opposition (Ashgate, 2010), will also be included in this exploration of neglected issues in Evangelical-Mormon dialogue.

I have just begun working through an advance copy of the uncorrected proof for Webb's Jesus Christ, Eternal God in preparation for my editing of this edition of STJ. I think readers will find the book, and the interactions at STJ of great interest, and some level of controversy (as Webb himself acknowledges), particularly where Webb interacts with Mormon metaphysics. From Webb's Introduction:

Chapter 9 might be the most controversial of my book, because I am convinced that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has much to contribute to contemporary theology, especially on the topic of Christian materialism. Unfortunately, creedal Christians rarely take Mormonism seriously. Perhaps the main reason for this neglect is the Mormon rejection of creation out of nothing, which puts it at odds with most of Western meta- physics and Christian theology. None of its philosophical positions has made it more prone to scholarly condescension than this one. Moreover, any attempt to articulate the perfectibility of matter runs the risk of being accused of a con- spiratorial alliance with the hermetic tradition, a confluence of magical, religious, and philosophical teachings that made every effort to infuse spirit into matter. Hermeticism is the opposite of Gnosticism; it seeks to enable matter to reach its potential by discerning the seeds of creativity planted therein (and thus is the father of emergent materialism), while Gnosticism sees matter as the evil product of an evil creator. I defend the Mormon tradition from the charge of esotericism, though admittedly its metaphysical presuppositions can be reconstructed in a variety of ways, given the informality of much Mormon the- ology. I think that traditional or creedal theologians have more to learn from Mormonism than any other religious tradition today, and that the Mormon position on matter can be reasonably defended, though I offer some suggestions on how to revise it in the light of the teaching of heavenly flesh.

We are planning on this issue of the journal being published by year's end. I highly recommend Jesus Christ, Eternal God for those interested in pursuing significant theological topics, particularly those that intersect with Mormon theology. The book can be ordered through Oxford University Press.

John Stott: RAndall Balmer's Memorial at Religion Dispatches

2011-07-31T15:48:00.002-06:00

John Stott, the great evangelical statesman, recently passed away. He has long been a role model for me as he combined his faith with not only a commitment to sharing that faith with gentleness and respect, but also in his holistic approach to his faith and his willingness to reassess aspects of it (such as in his leanings toward annihilationism in contrast with eternal punishment, a point worth considering in light of the Rob Bell Love Wins controversy).

Randall Balmer recently wrote a piece in Stott's memory for Religion Dispatches that is worth reading.

Guest Post at Flunking Sainthood: The Younger Evangelicals and 'Embodied Ministry'

2011-06-28T09:11:00.004-06:00

As an outgrowth of my recent guest appearance on a panel at the Mormon Matters podcast, Jana Riess invited me to write a guest post at her blog Flunking Sainthood. You can find the post titled "Are Younger Evangelicals More Respectful of Mormonism Than the Old Guard?". If you're an evangelical, please reserve judgment until you read the piece before rejecting it simply by the title. Here's my introductory paragraph:

In his book The Younger Evangelicals: Facing the Challenges of the New World (Baker, 2002), the late Robert E. Webber discussed the diversity of Protestant evangelicalism, and developments in this subculture’s religious landscape. He defined “younger evangelicals” to include anyone “who deals thoughtfully with the shift from 20^th- to 21^st-century culture.” These shifts involve different attitudes to theology, culture, and other religions. I include myself in this demographic (perhaps more by like-mindedness than age), and offer my thoughts on what this involves for evangelicals engaging Mormon culture.

Global Survey of Evangelical Protestant Leaders and Religious Conflict

2011-06-26T11:18:00.005-06:00

The Pew Form on Religion and Public Life has an interesting report out titled "Global Survey of Evangelical Protestant Leaders." One section addresses this group's opinion of religious conflict and other religions:

Conflict between religious groups, by contrast, does not loom as a particularly large concern for most of the evangelical leaders surveyed. A majority says that conflict between religious groups is either a small problem (41%) or not a problem at all (14%) in their countries – though a sizeable minority considers it either a moderately big problem (27%) or a very big problem (17%). Those who live in the Middle East and North Africa are especially inclined to see inter-religious conflict as a moderately big (37%) or very big problem (35%). Nine-in-ten evangelical leaders (90%) who live in Muslim-majority countries say the influence of Islam is a major threat, compared with 41% of leaders who live elsewhere.
On the whole, the evangelical Protestant leaders express favorable opinions of adherents of other faiths in the Judeo-Christian tradition, including Judaism, Catholicism and Eastern Orthodox Christianity. But of those who express an opinion, solid majorities express unfavorable views of Buddhists (65%), Hindus (65%), Muslims (67%) and atheists (70%). Interestingly, the leaders who live in Muslim-majority countries generally are more positive in their assessments of Muslims than are the evangelical leaders overall.

Later the report discusses tensions between religious traditions:

Overall, most of the evangelical leaders report that conflict between religious groups is not a big problem in their home countries. Leaders in the Middle East and North Africa are most likely to say religious conflict is a moderately big (37%) or very big (35%) problem. About half of those in the Asia-Pacific region (55%) and sub-Saharan Africa (49%) also see inter-religious conflict as a moderately or very big problem. By contrast, in North America, Latin America and Europe, majorities say it is either a small problem or not a problem at all.

Still, the survey finds some signs of tension with non-Christian religions, particularly Islam. Nearly seven-in-ten of the evangelical leaders (69%) name Islam as more prone to violence than other religions.7 Far more leaders say Islam and Christianity are “very different” (69%) than say the two faiths have “a lot in common” (25%). And a solid majority of the leaders who express an opinion (69%) feel that Muslims are generally unfriendly toward evangelicals in their country. Sizeable minorities also see Hindus (41%) and Buddhists (39%) as unfriendly toward evangelicals. Of the evangelical leaders who express opinions on other religious groups, most say they hold generally unfavorable views of Hindus (65%), Buddhists (65%) and Muslims (67%).

I'm a Guest at Mormon Matters Podcast

2011-06-07T08:19:00.007-06:00

Yesterday I was asked to be a guest as an evangelical on the Mormon Matters podcast. I will be appearing and discussing a variety of issues with host Dan Wotherspoon, and fellow guests Joanna Brooks, and Jana Reiss. We will be recording our conversation this coming Monday, June 13.

The discussion will surround an article by Warren Smith in Patheos which argued that evangelicals should not vote for Mitt Romney since a vote for him is, in his words, "a vote for the LDS Church."

You can also read a follow up interview with him at Patheos, and an interview with him by Joanna Brooks at Religion Dispatches.

Update: A written introduction and the podcast, "Why Are Mormons Seen as 'Dangerous by Some Evangelical Christians," can be read and listened to here at Mormon Matters.

In addition, Jana Riess has written an article in follow up to our conversation titled "When Theological Disagreement Spills Over into Anti-Mormonism" at her blog Flunking Sainthood.

New Volume on Heaven's Gate

2011-05-28T20:49:00.002-06:00

I recently learned of a new academic exploration of the Heaven's Gate UFO religious group.

Heaven's Gate:
Postmodernity and Popular Culture in a Suicide Group

Edited by George D. Chryssides, University of Birmingham, UK

On March 26, 1997, the bodies of 39 men and women were found in an opulent mansion outside San Diego, all victims of a mass suicide. Messages left by the Heaven's Gate group indicate that they believed they were stepping out of their 'physical containers' in order to ascend to a UFO that was arriving in the wake of the Hale-Bopp comet. The Heaven's Gate suicides were part of a series of major incidents involving New Religions in the 1990s, as the new millennium approached. Despite the major attention that Heaven's Gate attracted at the time of the suicides, there have been relatively few scholarly studies. This anthology on Heaven's Gate includes a combination of articles previously published in academic journals, some new writings from experts in the field, and some original Heaven's Gate documents. All the material is expertly brought together under the editorship of George D. Chryssides.

Contents: Foreword; Approaching Heaven's Gate, George D. Chryssides; '88 update – the UFO Two and their crew: a brief synopsis, Marshall Herff Applewhite; Seekers and saucers: the role of the cultic milieu in joining a UFO cult, Robert W. Balch and David Taylor; Religious studies and 'heaven's gate': making the strange familiar and the familiar strange, Mark W. Muesse; Heaven's Gate: the dawning of a new religious movement, Patricia L. Goerman; Heaven's Gate: a study of religious obedience, Winston Davis; The Devil at Heaven's Gate: rethinking the study of religion in the age of cyberspace, Hugh B. Urban; 'A sometimes mysterious place': Heaven's Gate and the manufactured crisis of the internet, Douglas E. Cowan; Scaling Heaven's Gate individualism and salvation in a new religious movement, Benjamin Ethan Zeller; 'Come on up and I will show thee': Heaven's Gate as a post-modern group, George D. Chryssides; Postscript; Appendix; Bibliography; Index.

About the Editor: George D. Chryssides is Research Fellow in Contemporary Religion at the University of Birmingham. He has written extensively on new religious movements: his books include The Advent of Sun Myung Moon (Macmillan, 1991), Exploring New Religions (Cassell, 1999), Historical Dictionary of New Religious Movements (Scarecrow Press, 2001) and A Reader in New Religious Movements (with Margaret Z. Wilkins, Continuum, 2006). He has contributed to numerous academic journals and edited collections.

Reviews: 'Heaven's Gate is one of the most interesting new religious groups to emerge in the twentieth century. Virtually unknown to scholars prior to its communal suicide in 1997, it has become the focus of significant research and important analysis. This worthwhile collection of studies is the most comprehensive to date. I enthusiastically commend it to anyone interested in understanding, not just UFO religions, but also the emergence and significance of new religions and alternative spiritualities more generally.'
-- Christopher Partridge, Lancaster University, UK

For further information, or to order a copy visit the Ashgate website.

Necropolis Now: Interview with Ronald Hutton

2011-05-20T21:23:00.003-06:00

Ronald Hutton, the scholar and historian who has written significant volumes on Paganism, including Triumph of the Moon, has given an interview worth reading at Necropolis Now. Here's an excerpt:

Did you write The Triumph of the Moon to demolish the traditional history of Pagan witchcraft?

Absolutely not: I wrote Triumph to fill a vacuum created by the collapse, within Britain, of that traditional history: which is why I do not devote any space in the book to a sustained attack on that history itself. The concept of early modern witchcraft as a surviving pagan religion, which had been scholarly orthodoxy in the mid-twentieth century, began to disappear among professional historians around 1970, along with many other nineteenth-century beliefs. At the same time, many Pagan witches who had worked with founding figures of traditions, such as Gerald Gardner, Alex Sanders and Robert Cochrane, had always expressed doubts regarding the truth of what those founders had claimed about the history of those traditions. By 1990 these two developments had converged to produce a general disbelief in the origin story of modern Paganism among its British leaders. During that year (before I had published anything on Paganism myself) I attended a conference held at Kings College London at which a succession of them declared that its traditional historiography should be regarded as myth and metaphor rather than literal history. As I mention in Triumph of the Moon, this had already also begun to occur in the United States from the 1970s: Isaac Bonewits, Aidan Kelly and Margot Adler all alerted American Pagans, in different ways, to the fact that the traditional account of their historical origins was problematic.

For those interested in Pagan studies, especially the recent controversy in some quarters surrounding Hutton's Triumph of the Moon, this interview is worth a read. It can be read here.

Investigation Discovery Looks at the West Memphis Three

2011-05-01T12:27:00.002-06:00

The Investigation Discovery Channel will be broadcasting the program True Crime with Aphrodite Jones with a focus on the West Memphis Three on May 5 and 8. See the program listing here. My previous interview with one of the defense attorneys in this case, Dan Stidham, can be read here.

Robert Schreiter Interview on Local Theologies

2011-02-25T15:46:00.004-07:00

In the past I posted on an interesting book by Robert J. Schreiter titled Constructing Local Theologies (Orbis Books, 2002). In my previous post I discussed Schreiter and his ideas related to local theologies as follows:

Schreiter is a Catholic theologian who is part of the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago. I found his Catholic perspective, as well as his theological and cultural savvy to be extremely helpful in reflecting on theological contextualization. In his view contemporary pluralism presents a "multiplicity of new pastoral and theological problems unprecedented in Christian history." Schreiter discusses some of these unique challenges that arise in a variety of forms, such as the asking of new questions in differing cultural contexts, questions that impact even the most routine issues of church life often taken for granted in the West:

"Indeed, so many new questions were emerging that the credibility of existing forms of theology was weakened. For example, questions about the eucharistic elements: How was one to celebrate the Eucharist in countries that were Muslim theocracies and forbade the production of importation of fermented beverages? What was one to do in those cultures where bread products such as bread were not known, in which the unconsecrated bread itself became a magical object because of its foreignness? Or how was one to celebrate baptism among the Masai in East Africa, where to pour water on the head of a woman was to curse her with infertility? How was one to understand Vatican Council II's opening to non-Christian religions in countries in southern Asia where Christianity seemed destined to remain a minority religion?"

In order to address these questions in ways that are theologically and culturally responsible, Schreiter suggests that we need to develop local theologies. He defines this as a form of theology that "begins with the needs of a people in a concrete place, and from there moves to the traditions of faith," and which involves a "dynamic interaction among gospel, church, and culture." Schreiter sees this starting place with culture as a strength as it begins "with the questions that the people themselves have" rather than the concerns of the church that often result in a theology and ecclesiology disconnected from local cultures.

I have been trying to get with Schreiter for some time for an interview to discuss questions of mine that have arisen over the course of my own dialogue between theologies, (sub)cultures, and various religious groups. Following are my questions and Schreiter's responsive thoughts.

Morehead's Musings: Protestant evangelicals are used to thinking about theology in terms of received historical theologies like Calvinism or Wesleyanism. Yet you describe a need for "local theologies." Why are these Protestant historical theologies examples of local theologies even if Protestants don't recognize them as such, and how do you define local theologies in terms of new expressions of theology in cultural and subcultural contexts?

Robert Schreiter: Theologians of whatever denominational stripe or inclination think their theology works above or apart from the context because of its subject: God. But even those who affirm biblical literacy have to contend with the fact that the Bible was written down by finite humans. Take a look at the document that came out of the October 2010 Capetown meeting of the Lausanne Covenant. (Incidentally I have an article appearing on the mission theology of the Lausanne Covenant's three big meetings, appearing in April in the International Bulletin of Missionary Research).

The theology of, say, John Calvin can be seen as local inasmuch as his writings were shaped by a response to a specific historical circumstance--reform of the Church in the 16th century. Local or contextual theologies are sensitive to context, but they are not determined by it.

Nearly all Western theologians seem to have difficulty accepting the limitations of their formulations. I get requests all the time (especially from Europe) to talk about the "universal" in the "local" theologies.

Morehead's Musings: Many evangelicals have been wary of sociology and have usually not brought it into dialogue with theology. How might a sociology of knowledge be significant for local theology formation?

Robert Schreiter: What I call a "sociology of theology" (that part of the book is widely quoted) is really built on a sociology of knowledge, i.e., a realization that all knowledge is situated, even as it reaches out beyond its situatedness. My point was to say that the location (monastery, university, oppressive situations) shape the form that theology takes. Another way is to look at theology's addressees: for whom is it intended, and what counts for them as genuine knowledge?

Morehead's Musings: I have been impressed with the missionary work of Catholics historically, particularly Jesuits like Matteo Ricci. Were they involved in the development of local theologies as you discuss, drawing upon the cultural tools they had available to them in their time?

Robert Schreiter: Was Ricci a local theologian? In many ways he (and perhaps even more, his contemporary Roberto de Nobili in India) was, albeit ahead of his time? Such local theologies arose when it became clear that the received theology Ricci and others were trying to transmit could not be understood or was regularly misunderstood by its intended audience. It is this disconnect that prompted the beginnings of contextual theology in the 1970s. It was certainly the reason I was drawn into it.

Morehead's Musings: At one point in your book you state: "..in cultures where human growth is not seen as personal achievement, but as discovering the underlying and unchanging patterns of the universe and coming into conformance with them, wisdom theology will find a ready home. The ideal of a fulfilled human life becomes one where a conformity to those archetypes of existence is carried out. One thinks of the Greek concept of paideia, the quest of the alchemist, and the discovery of the unity of the atman and the Brahman in Indian religion in this regard." At another point previous to this you reference the importance of kinship to theology for other groups. Here I am thinking that the former insights would have great relevance in a theology for Western esotericism and Paganism, and the latter with Latter-day Saints (Mormons). While we might think of wisdom and kinship theologies as being relevant for the peoples of Asia and Africa, in the West aren't esoteric and Latter-day Saint theologies examples of the types of connections between various subcultural groups and local theologies that can be made?

Robert Schreiter: One work you might consult is by the Roman Catholic theologian Elizabeth Johnson: her Friends of Apostles and Prophets which is on the doctrine of the communion of the saints. You will get some good connections by looking at what has been written on Christians' relations with the ancestors, especially in Africa and East Asia.

Morehead's Musings: One of the greatest challenges for Protestants, particularly evangelicals with their concern for orthodoxy over against heresy, has been the fear of syncretism. But with this concern in mind you suggest that syncretism raises the question as to how serious we are about contextualization. With the lack of success in missions in Muslim, Buddhist, and Hindu cultures, it would appear that we need to be more bold and experimental in the formulation of local theologies. In this regard you write: "Is there a Buddhist way of being Christian, or a Hindu way of being Christian? Those two great traditions have been able to accommodate Christianity, but Christianity does not seem able to accommodate them." You then mention Christian "exclusivist thought patterns," and ask "Are those thought patterns essential to Christianity or do they represent certain cultural categories only?" How might those wishing to develop new local theologies that begin with the prisms of other traditions do so in ways that engage in healthy forms of syncretism, as religious studies understands the term (as opposed to theologians who view it as wholly negative).

Robert Schreiter: Syncretism continues to be a touchy subject across most of the religious spectrum. Practice is outstripping theory on this one. Robert Putnam in his recent book American Grace found some 80% of average Christians (across the spectrum) accepting a "pluralist" position on Christ and other religions, despite the tenets of their churches. It seems to have grown out of the experience of the goodness found in believers of other faiths. I took up the question of syncretism again in The New Catholicity. On double belonging, see Catherine Cornille, Many Mansions? and Paul Knitter's recent book on how he considers himself a Buddhist Christian.

Morehead's Musings: Thank you for your thoughts on these issues. I look forward to your IMBR article.

Interview at Vampires.com

2011-02-19T18:26:00.002-07:00

A new interview with me has been posted at Vampires.com where I discuss not only my thoughts on the origins of vampires in folklore and mythology, as well as vampires in popular culture and as an identity group, but also on figures like Bill Schnoebelen and Don Rimer. The interview can be read here.

Don Rimer: Occult Expert or Merchant of Fear?

2011-02-17T19:23:00.008-07:00

Update 1/22/12: Don Rimer passed away on Saturday, 1/21/12.

As I keep in touch with various aspects of my research interests at times I find a few surprises. In this case it came not from my direct research, but in something related to it.

I was researching the vampire subculture and checking in with a few websites related to this, as well as on Pagan websites I frequent, and found mention of a gentleman claiming to be an expert in "the occult", and using this "expertise" to lead seminars and provide consulting on "occult ritual crimes" for law enforcement, as well as the media and various civic groups. The individual is Don Rimer, and I found him mentioned on both vampire and Pagan websites as someone who keeps quite busy presenting his views on the dangers of everything from Afro-Caribbean religions to the vampire culture to various fantasy-role playing games. Given these claims I thought it was worth exploring.

My research led to me learn that Don Rimer is a retired police officer, who now presents seminars through the Oklahoma Gang Investigators Unit. His views on "ritual crime and the occult" can be found in a document on the OGIU website titled "Ritual Crime and the Occult (the New Youth Subculture)" from 2009. This document casts quite a wide net of concern, and in so doing, I detected several problematic areas, troubling in that it comes from a self-described expert, and someone providing guidance to law enforcement and thereby impacting lives in significant fashion.

Due to my concerns, yet perplexed as to why someone would present misinformation in the name of expertise and be sought out for thousands of presentations, I thought I would share some bibliographical suggestions with Mr. Rimer via email in terms of good scholarly literature that might help shape his understanding of the issue. In response, Mr. Rimer stated that he gained his accurate knowledge of the groups in question through study with Wiccans, Vampires "and those who worship Satan." He also claimed that the document at the OGIU site was an "old edition" and that he had sent them a new one to be uploaded. As of the date of this post the document I originally reviewed is still there, and the same misinformation is presented by Mr. Rimer in the name of "occultic expertise."

After my exchanges with Mr. Rimer I thought I would solicit feedback from academic colleagues of mine who specialize in these areas, as well as representatives from the religious communities and identity subcultures who are knowledgeable about the issues, and Rimer's views on the matter. Without exception, everyone confirmed my suspicions. In fact, while Rimer has had some contact with those in the Pagan community, I could not track down anyone willing to agree that he accurately describes Paganism, and his claims about learning from vampires may be limited to magazine articles and random conversations at vampire clubs as well as newspaper articles on alleged "vampire killings," hardly the stuff of good ethnographic research and scholarly study.

My colleagues did point me toward additional resources that discuss Rimer and his problematic views on the "occult." These include a lengthy consideration of Rimer at Witchvox (http://www.witchvox.com/va/dt_article.html?a=cabc&id=8939. In addition, I benefited greatly from those associated with the Atlanta Vampire Alliance and their research materials through Suscitatio Enterprises, LLC (http://www.suscitatio.com). These sources are worth interacting with, not only for accurate understandings of Paganism, Wicca, and the vampire subculture, but also for correctives to Rimer's misinformation on these and other subjects.

It is not necessary to repeat the critiques of Rimer offered in the sources mentioned above, and others that can be found online, but I would like the reader to come away with the following:

Problematic terminology and definitions
Rimer uses the term "occult" not only in a pejorative manner for various expressions of Western esotericism, but also as a blanket term for a diverse group of unrelated religions, spiritualities, and identity subcultures.

Imagined connections
Rimer makes inappropriate connections between various elements to alleged "ritual crime." Of course there are crimes, sometimes very grisly, but isolated cases of crime are not necessarily connected appropriately, nor do they flow out of, the groups he describes as dangerous.

Unfamiliarity with scholarship
Rimer is unfamiliar with the good body of academic materials on this subject matter, as well as the related to topic of satanic panics. In fact, in comments made to me he seems to hold academics at a distance and privileges his lay approach at "expertise." He doesn't have to be a scholar, but he should be familiar with the academic material related to the subjects he's instructing others on.

Counter-cult influences
Rimer also appears to be influenced by Protestant evangelical counter-cult approaches to the subjects he lectures on, which tends to lump diverse phenomena together with a primary concern that whatever religion or spirituality that is non-Christian is somehow connected to the demonic.

Despite the serious flaws in his approach, and the misinformation contained in his presentations, Rimer continues to be sought after and provides input to law enforcement, including training on how to identity alleged occult ritual crime. One of his most recent cases took place in Chesapeake, Virginia, where a woman was arrested for killing pigs and burglarizing a church. Thankfully in this Wavy.com story Rimer is quoted as (rightly) saying that there is nothing to link the woman with satanic worship. But Rimer's strange understanding of the things he labels as "occultic" will eventually lead him to mislead law enforcement, perhaps hampering the arrest of real criminals, or leading to the arrest of innocent people in the fervor of satanic panics.

My advice to law enforcement and other civic groups is to seek out responsible sources of information for their knowledge of religious and spiritual groups, as well as identity subcultures. Mr. Rimer seems more like a merchant of fear than an occult expert.

Mormons, Folklore, and the Paranormal

2011-02-15T16:05:00.005-07:00

Recently I posted an interview with the authors of Paranormal America (NYU Press, 2010) which presented sociological analysis of paranormal adherents based upon the American Religious Identification Survey. This type of research is very helpful as it not only touches on those who accept paranormal phenomena, but also in its conclusions in regards to the paranormal and how it relates or doesn't relate to those within various religious traditions.

One religious group not considered in this survey was the Mormons. Not to worry. There is a forthcoming book that addresses the place of paranormal experiences and folklore in Mormon history.

Between Pulpit and Pew: The Supernatural World in Mormon History and Folklore
W. Paul Reeve and Michael Scott Van Wagenen
5.5 x 8.5, est 256 pages

ISBN 978-0-87421-838-1
paper $21.95 (available April)

ISBN 978-0-87421-823-7
e-book $18.00 (available July)

Cain wanders the frontier as a Bigfoot-like hairy beast and confronts an early Mormon apostle. An evil band of murderers from Mormon scripture, known as the Gadianton robbers, provides an excuse for the failure of a desert town. Stories of children raised from the dead with decayed bodies and damaged minds help draw boundaries between the proper spheres of human and divine action. Mormons who observe UFOs in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries find ways to explain them in relation to the church’s cosmology. The millenarian dimension of that belief system induces church members to invest in the Dream Mine, a hidden treasure that a would-be heir to Joseph Smith wraps in prophecy of the end times. A Utah version of Nessie haunts a large mountain lake. Non-Mormons attempt to discredit Joseph Smith with tales that he had tried and failed to walk on water.

Mormons gave distinctive meanings to supernatural legends and events, but their narratives incorporated motifs found in many cultures. Many such historical legends and beliefs found adherents down to the present. This collection employs folklore to illuminate the cultural and religious history of a people.

Contents

Elaine Thatcher, Foreword

W. Paul Reeve and Michael Scott Van Wagenen, "Between Pulpit and Pew: Where History and Lore Intersect"

Matthew Bowman, "A Mormon Bigfoot: David Patten's Cain and the Conception of Evil in LDS Folklore"

W. Paul Reeve, "'As Ugly as Evil,' and 'As Wicked as Hell': Gadianton Robbers and the Legend Process among the Mormons"

Matthew Bowman, "Raising the Dead: Mormons, Evangelicals, and Miracles in America"

Michael Scott Van Wagenen, "Singular Phenomena: The Evolving Mormon Interpretation of Unidentified Flying Objects"

Kevin Cantera, "A Currency of Faith: Taking Stock in Utah County's Dream Mine"

Alan L. Morrell, "A Nessie in Mormon Country"

Stanley J. Thayne, "Walking on Water: Nineteenth-Century Prophets and a Legend of Religious Imposture"

My thanks to aquinas of Summa Theologica for bringing this to my attention.

Special Edition of Sacred Tribes Journal on Dark Green Religion Online

2011-02-10T11:45:00.002-07:00

It was many months in the making, from initial concept, to the solicitation of articles, to article submission, editing, formatting and eventually publishing, but the special edition of Sacred Tribes Journal, Volume 6, no. 1 (Spring 2011) is now available. This edition focuses on Dark Green Religion and the book of the same title by Bron Taylor.

This edition of the journal includes an extensive interview with Taylor, responses by Christian environmentalists Loren Wilkinson and Peter Illyn, interations by Taylor with Wilkinson and llyn's essays, and a response to this by Wilkinson. The issue also includes my film review of Avatar, and commentary on the book The Lost World of Genesis One, both of which dovetail with applications to Dark Green Religion.

I couldn't be happier with the way this turned out, and I hope that this volume opens the door for ongoing dialogue in various venues on this topic between those concerned with this form of spirituality from whatever perspective brought to it. The special edition can be found here.

Academic Conference on Religion Satanism

2011-02-09T15:33:00.003-07:00

From the sociology of religion email list:

Satanism is a subject that has always drawn a lot of media attention as well as interest from the general public. Scholarly studies of the subject, however, have more often focused on socially constructed "Satanic Panics" than on Satanism as a religious alternative in itself. Recently, this has begun to change, and anthologies such as Contemporary Religious Satanism (Ed. Jesper A Petersen, Ashgate, 2009) have started to fill the gaps in scholarly knowledge concerning Satanism. A further attempt to remedy the situation was made when the first ever international scholarly conference on Satanism was organized in Trondheim, Norway, in 2009. The conference was a great success, and resulted in an anthology that will be published by Oxford University Press later this year. In September 2011, we welcome you to Stockholm, Sweden for the follow-up to 2009's gathering of specialists.

Keynote speaker: Marco Pasi

Deadline for abstracts: May 22, 2011.
Submit your abstract to: per.faxneld@rel.su.se and
kennet.granholm@rel.su.se
(remember to submit abstracts to both organisers).

Papers dealing with most aspects of Satanism are welcome (including Satanism in literature, cinema, etc). However, we discourage papers treating "the Satanic panic", "Satanic ritual abuse", etc, as these themes have received sufficient scholarly attention. Conference fee will be announced later.

http://www.erg.su.se/pub/jsp/polopoly.jsp?d=16068

Sacred Folly Coming in March

2011-01-29T11:08:00.004-07:00

Sacred Folly: A New History of the Feast of Fools by Max Harris (Cornell University Press), is scheduled for publication in March of this year. Previously I have written on the significance of the concept of sacred follow for the church:

This book will update and correct remarks Harris has made previously about the Feast of Fools in his book Carnival and Other Christian Festivals: Folk Theology and Folk Performance (University of Texas Press, 2003). As I have argued previously in my masters thesis on Burning Man, and in several posts on this blog, western evangelicalism would do well to reflect on the importance of festival and play in connection with ecclesiology and worship and how the historical Feast of Fools, properly understood in its historical and ecclesiological contexts in the past, might be recontextualized in certain subcultural contexts for the present.

The publisher's website describes the book as follows:

For centuries, the Feast of Fools has been condemned and occasionally celebrated as a disorderly, even transgressive Christian festival, in which reveling clergy elected a burlesque Lord of Misrule, presided over the divine office wearing animal masks or women’s clothes, sang obscene songs, swung censers that gave off foul-smelling smoke, played dice at the altar, and otherwise parodied the liturgy of the church. Afterward, they would take to the streets, howling, issuing mock indulgences, hurling manure at bystanders, and staging scurrilous plays. The problem with this popular account—intriguing as it may be— is that it is wrong.

In Sacred Folly Max Harris rewrites the history of the Feast of Fools, showing that it developed in the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries as an elaborate and orderly liturgy for the day of the Circumcision (1 January)—serving as a dignified alternative to rowdy secular New Year festivities. The intent of the feast was not mockery but thanksgiving for the incarnation of Christ. Prescribed role reversals, in which the lower clergy presided over divine office, recalled Mary’s joyous affirmation that God “has put down the mighty from their seat and exalted the humble.” The “fools” represented those chosen by God for their lowly status.

The feast, never widespread, was largely confined to cathedrals and collegiate churches in northern France. In the fifteenth century, high-ranking clergy who relied on rumor rather than firsthand knowledge attacked and eventually suppressed the feast. Eighteenth- and nineteenth-century historians repeatedly misread records of the feast; their erroneous accounts formed a shaky foundation for subsequent understanding of the medieval ritual. By returning to the primary documents, Harris reconstructs a Feast of Fools that is all the more remarkable for being sanctified rather than sacrilegious.

Reviews

"Sacred Folly is a major achievement; it is a book that we have needed, and Max Harris is preeminently the person to have written it. It reads gracefully, and the author is an attractive presence throughout."—David Bevington, Phyllis Fay Horton Distinguished Service Professor in the Humanities, University of Chicago

"In this bracingly revisionist book, Max Harris overturns long-held assumptions about the nature and functions of the Feast of Fools. Denounced by fifteenth-century French theologians as a wanton and ungodly rite, the Feast of Fools was in reality, as Harris shows, a reverential, not a rowdy, holiday. With incisive analysis and meticulous scholarship, Sacred Folly sets the record straight. In doing so, it unearths the fascinating history of one of the most misunderstood liturgical festivities."—Claire Sponsler, University of Iowa

"Max Harris has written an important and necessary book, offering for the first time an accurate history of a subject that has been persistently and consistently misrepresented in scholarship. No other book has even remotely approached the thorough revision of the history of the Feast of Fools successfully undertaken here. Harris takes on the daunting tasks of sorting accurate from biased interpretation, tracing the passing down of error from scholar to scholar, and identifying the deliberate introduction and transmission of misinformation. Harris not only demolishes an inaccurate history but also constructs a new and durable one to replace it."—Pamela Sheingorn, Bernard M. Baruch College and Graduate Center, CUNY

"The modern history of medieval ritual has long been a history of misinformation and misunderstanding. This engaging book is a crucial intervention that should recalibrate the methods for studying early liturgy, drama, and popular culture; it also suggests the need for a reevaluation of larger historical narratives. By gathering, disentangling, and contextualizing primary and secondary sources produced over two millennia, Max Harris proves that the Feast of Fools was a legitimate liturgical celebration shaped by specific historical developments in the twelfth century and in certain areas of northern France. In so doing, he not only reconstructs the circumstances in which clergy conceptualized, crafted, performed, and defended a particular festive liturgy; he also exposes the ways that changing notions of propriety distorted secondhand accounts of it, leading to its suppression in the fifteenth century and the metastasizing of these erroneous reports down to the present day. This is an exemplary work of scholarship: careful but wide-ranging, lucid, and humane."—Carol Symes, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

About the Author

Max Harris is Executive Director Emeritus of the Wisconsin Humanities Council, University of Wisconsin–Madison. He has also taught at Yale University and the University of Virginia. He is the author of four previous books, including Carnival and Other Christian Festivals: Folk Theology and Folk Performance and Aztecs, Moors, and Christians: Festivals of Reconquest in Mexico and Spain.

Patheos: An Evangelical Graduates from the Mormon Institute Program

2011-01-26T16:46:00.003-07:00

There was a recent post at Patheos that is worth reading titled "An Evangelical Graduates from the Mormon Institute Program." Here's the introduction:

After four years of attendance and participation, David recently graduated from an LDS Institute of Religion. The odd thing is: David's not Mormon, never has been, and may never be. He is, in fact, a committed Evangelical, and a PhD student in Molecular Biology. Ben Spackman, one of his Institute teachers, asked him about his inter-religious experience.

(Note: Within the Mormon context, "Institute" refers to church-sponsored religious instruction for students attending colleges, universities, and other postsecondary institutions. For more details, see this entry in the Encyclopedia of Mormonism.)

The piece can be read here.

An Interview with the Authors of "Paranormal America"

2011-01-19T16:38:00.008-07:00

Paranormal America: Ghost Encounters, UFO Sightings, Bigfoot Hunts, and Other Curiosities in Religion and Culture, written by Christopher D. Bader, F. Carson Mencken, and Joseph D. Baker (New York: New York University Press, 2010).

A visit to most bookstores, particularly large chain bookstores, will reveal a large collection of books that explore various facets of the paranormal. These phenomena and experiences are found throughout popular culture, and are frequently depicted in popular television programs and films. Recently, three scholars conducted sociological research that looked at those involved in the paranormal as a part of American religious culture.

In the interview that follows Christopher Bader, F. Carson Mencken, and Joseph O. Baker discuss their research findings as compiled in their book Paranormal America. Bader and Mencken are Associate Professors of Sociology at Baylor University, and Baker is Assistant Professor of Sociology at East Tennessee State University.

John W. Morehead: Thank you for your fine book, and for your willingness to discuss the results of your research. As you know, the paranormal has a marginalizing effect among those who give it any kind of credibility, even as a research topic. How did you come to develop an interest in the sociology of the paranormal, and why were you willing to engage the subject matter perhaps at the risk of your academic credibility?

Christopher Bader: I have long been interested in the paranormal as a sociological phenomenon as I grew up in the Pacific Northwest and was always fascinated with Bigfoot.

It is risky for scientists of many fields to take the paranormal seriously. However, we cannot claim to be especially brave. As sociologists we are interested in the behaviors of people, rather than the reality (or lack thereof) of a given phenomenon. So long as people believe in something and act upon that belief we are interested as sociologists. In other words, we are not really studying Bigfoot, ghosts and UFOs, rather we are studying people who believe in such things. We do not come down on either side of the fence with regard to the reality of paranormal phenomena, since doing so is irrelevant to our work. Certainly we have received our share of giggles and jokes as the result of our research, but the nature of our perspective protects our credibility.

John W. Morehead: Is it possible that academics might make more room in the near future for the possibility of studying the paranormal from the perspectives of sociology of religion and religious studies as a legitimate subject matter?

Christopher Bader: The answer depends upon what you mean by “legitimate subject matter.” The academic community has been slow to consider the paranormal seriously. As you noted in your previous question, academics are very fearful of their reputations and the paranormal is a ridiculed subject. I do not think you can expect to see academics seriously considering the potential reality of paranormal experiences in the near future.

However, I do believe that you will see increased interested in the paranormal as a cultural phenomenon, since belief in paranormal subjects is clearly growing in the United States. Just as academics, particularly social scientists, seriously study the effects of religion on other beliefs and behaviors, I believe you will see the paranormal receive increasing attention in the same manner—particularly within the sociology of religion.

John W. Morehead: How do you define the paranormal, and how are the various phenomena which comprise it differentiated from those in mainstream religions?

Joseph D. Baker: Defining the paranormal was one of the most difficult tasks in conducting this research. In some ways most of us already “know” what is considered paranormal because of implicit definitions employed in popular culture; however, on many issues the line is unclear. Ultimately we settled upon using a definition that draws on both science and religion as social institutions. If a particular belief (or by implication experience) is promoted by an organized, established religious tradition, then we considered it religious rather than paranormal. If the issue in question in not accepted by established religious traditions, then we utilized the stance of institutional science as a second cultural signifier. In our study, issues that are not accepted by either established religious traditions or institutional science were considered paranormal. It is important to note that these distinctions are cultural rather than intrinsic to the issues in question. For instance, what is the difference between a religious, angelic experience and certain types of alien encounter experiences? Most importantly, the attributed source of the experience and whether it is legitimated by the agents of an established religious tradition. Since these definitions are culturally constituted rather than inherent to the topics, what is considered “paranormal” may change over time or between cultural contexts. We addressed this briefly by looking at beliefs and experiences that are considered “religious,” but border on the cultural boundaries of the paranormal. Guardian angel experiences and belief in supernatural evil are examples.

John W. Morehead: What percentage of Americans believe in some form of the paranormal, and how do people come to accept these beliefs? More specifically, you mention Travis Hirschi's ideas about deviance in relation to the conventional order. Can you also touch on his ideas about bonding to conventional society, and how those interested in the paranormal are more willing to engage in unconventional beliefs?

F. Carson Mencken: Two thirds of Americans have at least one paranormal belief. We argue in our book that two factors drive paranormal belief and research: enlightenment and discovery. In terms of sociological theories, we use Hirschi's social control approach in conjunction with Stark and Bainbridge’s work on religious compensators to explain how discovery and enlightenment would lead the disconnected to unconventional beliefs. Those who have strong bonds to society (people in power, high status careers, structural positions of authority and responsibility) are highly conventional in their lifestyles. It is an expected (i.e. normative) pattern. One aspect of living a conventional lifestyle to is believe and practice conventional beliefs/rituals (i.e. Christianity, Judaism in the United States). When someone who is expected to live a conventional lifestyle strays from expected (i.e. normative) behavior patterns, they risk sanctions (as Nancy Reagan did with her use of astrology in the White House). Those who are less connected to society, which may represent the poor, uneducated on one end, and the hyper-educated, non-conformist types on the other end, do not risk the same sanctions by pursuing alternative belief systems.

But this in and of itself is not enough to spur people to the paranormal. There has to be a reason why people will seek alternative belief systems. One theory which applies to those of lower socioeconomic status is religious compensators. Since conventional religiosity is for and run by highly conventional people and provides many empirical rewards for this group, those from lower socioeconomic status groups will not gain many spiritual or conventional rewards from participating in conventional religion. Alternative beliefs systems can be empowering. The discovery of something spiritually unique (an unknown secret to the universe) that the rest of society does not have gives those from excluded groups a sense of purpose, a status as someone important.

Moreover, all humans are seeking enlightenment and discovery. New information helps us to reduce risk in our lives, and to make better informed decisions. Many paranormal practices (psychics, mediums, communication with the dead, astrology, etc.) are about giving people an insight into their future. Those groups not bound to conventional religious systems are freer to explore these alternative systems in order to gain information that may help them improve their lives.

Those who are hyper-educated, or cultural elites, may condemn conventional norms of behavior as too bourgeosie. Most cultural elites are early adapters. They tend to be the first to accept new ideas (e.g. evolution), new social norms (e.g. racial integration, inter-racial marriage, same sex couples), etc. The cultural elites are also the practitioners of new religious movements (NRMs). Their wide range of knowledge and experiences make them less threatened by unconventional ideas and practices. Moreover, their curious nature makes them drawn to discovery and enlightenment. This group is more likely to explore alternative ideas of reality (existence of UFOs, the possibility that another intelligent life form has mastered long-distance space travel, ESP, telekinesis, etc.). Their journey of discovery and enlightenment is not so much motivated by personal salvation (i.e., What does the future hold for me? ), as much as by the attempt to improve the human condition.

As with those from lower socioeconomic groups, the cultural elites are not as wed to conventional society. The risks involved with their exploration of alternative belief systems are not great, compared to someone who highly integrated into conventional society (such as a college president).

John W. Morehead: Your research indicates that certain religious groups, such as Protestant evangelicals, are resistant to the paranormal. I must be an anomaly in this in that I come from a conservative Protestant background but still have an interest in the paranormal both as an academic subject matter and in the possibilities for the phenomena. Why is this religious group resistant to the paranormal?

Joseph D. Baker: The connection between organized religion and the paranormal is complicated and multi-faceted. Certain types of religious groups—those that are more exclusive in their outlook (i.e. as possessing the “one true” path to Truth)—tend to oppose paranormal beliefs. Accordingly, adherents of traditions such as evangelical Protestants hold relatively few of these beliefs. In some instances, members of such groups may even believe in the reality of paranormal topics, but attribute their existence to the work of Satan. Meanwhile, those who are decidedly irreligious are not likely to hold paranormal beliefs either, because they reject super-empirical views (or at least those beyond institution science) in general. So who then, religiously speaking, is most likely to believe in paranormal topics and be involved in paranormal subcultures? Those who are members of moderately “strict” religious groups and who express moderate levels of religious belief and practice. In other words, a member of a liberal Protestant congregation who attends religious services once a month is more likely to be interested in the paranormal than either a conservative Protestant who attends multiple services a week or an atheist who is not affiliated with a religious tradition and never attends services. The short answer to these complicated issues is that moderate religious involvement in a mainline religious tradition indicates a potential openness to the ideas of the paranormal, whereas intense religious involvement with a stricter religious tradition closes one off to the paranormal because these individuals have put all their “spiritual eggs in one basket.” The connections between religiosity and the paranormal could best be though of as “curvilinear.”

John W. Morehead: Were there any stereotypes about the paranormal that you had overturned as a result of your research?

Christopher Bader: We believe that our book conclusively overturns several stereotypes about the paranormal. One stereotype about paranormal believers and experiencers is that they are of below average education, suggesting that the paranormal is the province of people who are not sufficiently educated to “know better.” In fact, we find that education has little effect on most paranormal beliefs. In other words, people of higher levels of education are no more or less likely to believe in UFOs, Bigfoot, Atlantis and many other phenomenon as are those who never graduated high school. There are some exceptions. For example, people who never graduated high school are somewhat more likely to believe in ghosts and astrology, but in general the stereotype does not hold. There is also no evidence that income has a strong effect on most paranormal beliefs; paranormal beliefs are not limited to the suffering or downtrodden.

John W. Morehead: Is it appropriate to think of the paranormal as a fringe phenomenon at present, and what do the future prospects look like for its popularity?

F. Carson Mencken: With two-thirds of the American population holding at least one paranormal belief, the paranormal is not fringe. In fact, in many ways it is quite normal. However, the paranormal is not an organized social movement. It poses no threat to conventional religious beliefs. There church of the paranormal is not going to supplant Christianity. In order for the paranormal to become a fringe movement, it must become better organized into a movement, with unified beliefs, rituals, etc. Currently, it has none of these. Here is what we can confidently say about the future of the paranormal in the United States. First, there are significant demographic trends among believers and practitioners of the paranormal. We document these trends throughout every chapter of our book. Second, the population of the United States is dynamic. Over the next thirty years we will see major shifts in the racial/ethnic and age compositions of the nation. The groups that are going to grow over the next 30 years are the groups that are currently the most likely to believe and practice the paranormal. Based on these two conclusions, we expect the percentage of the population who believes in the paranormal to grow. However, what is left to be determined is how the shift in the racial/ethnic and age compositions will affect the nature of social bonding. It may be that as these paranormal believing groups become larger in numbers they may also become more conventional in their social bonds, and hence their beliefs/practices. Only time will tell.

John W. Morehead: Gentlemen, thank you for your thoughts on this subject matter, and for your research that I hope you and others will build upon.

An Astrotheology of Extraterrestrial Life

2011-01-19T09:08:00.004-07:00

A recent article in the Guardian.co.uk had the title "Earth must prepare for close encounter with aliens, say scientists". The article goes on not to detail elements from the cultural fringe, but to describe a publication on the subject from the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. This interesting publication addresses the subject of extraterrestrial life from a variety of perspectives, including religion. In considering the implications of extraterrestrial life for theology, the paper includes a contribution by Ted Peters with the following abstract:

This paper asks about the future of religion: (i) Will confirmation of extra-terrestrial intelligence (ETI) cause terrestrial religion to collapse? ‘No’ is the answer based upon a summary of the ‘Peters ETI Religious Crisis Survey’. Then the paper examines four specific challenges to traditional doctrinal belief likely to be raised at the detection of ETI: (ii) What is the scope of God’s creation? (iii) What can we expect regarding the moral character of ETI? (iv) Is one earthly incarnation in Jesus Christ enough for the entire cosmos, or should we expect multiple incarnations on multiple planets? (v) Will contact with more advanced ETI diminish human dignity? More than probable contact with extra-terrestrial intelligence will expand the Bible’s vision so that all of creation—including the 13.7 billion year history of the universe replete with all of God’s creatures—will be seen as the gift of a loving and gracious God.

There are several interesting facets to this paper, including Peters's survey of representatives from various religious traditions who state that they would not be upset by the discovery of extraterrestrial life, but they believe their tradition would be threatened. Beyond this, Peters's paper brings together several strands of thought to formulate an "astrotheology" that takes us beyond the reactions against this found many times in evangelicalism, at least in the countercult in response to the UFO phenomenon.

Peters's paper can be read here, and an MP3 of his presentation can be downloaded here.

Peter Berger on Interreligious Dialogue

2011-01-12T16:22:00.002-07:00

From the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace & World Affairs website:

Dialogue Between Religious Traditions in an Age of Relativity

February 16, 2011 | 04:00PM

Berkley Center third floor conference room, 3307 M Street, NW

»rsvp required

Globalization has dramatically increased communication across religious traditions, raising complex questions about the relative validity of their very different truth claims. Peter Berger of Boston University will address new patterns of dialogue among religious traditions and their wider cultural and political implications in today's world. A reception will follow.

Peter Berger is one of the foremost scholars in the field of sociology of religion. He is Professor Emeritus of Religion, Sociology and Theology and served previously as the founding director of the Institute on Culture, Religion and World Affairs at Boston University. He has also taught at University of North Carolina, Hartford Theological Seminary, Rutgers, and the New School for Social Research. His work has focused on sociological theory, sociology of religion, and issues at the intersection of theology and social science. His recent works include Questions of Faith: A Skeptical Reaffirmation of Christianity (2004), Religious America, Secular Europe (with Grace Davie and Effie Fokas, 2008), and In Praise of Doubt: How to Have Convictions without Becoming a Fanatic (with Anton Zijderveld, 2009). Berger earned his BA from Wagner College and his MA and PhD from the New School for Social Research.

From Political to Religious Finger Pointing in Tucson

2011-01-10T12:53:00.009-07:00

The nonstop news cycle continues to grind on with its coverage of the Tucson shooting tragedy. Unfortunately, it didn't take long for various individuals to begin pointing fingers of blame and assuming an understanding of influences if not causation.

While the rhetoric continues in terms of blaming political ideologies, a new wrinkle was added today as reported by The New York Daily News. They have obtained photographs from the accused shooter's backyard, including what the media is describing as an "occult shrine or altar". It is visible in the photograph accompanying this post where an artificial skull (possibly a Halloween decoration), some decayed fruit, and candles are visible alongside a bag of potting soil. What can we determine from this? Not much. The potting soil indicates an interest in gardening, and the candles an interest in a light source (with a measure of ambiance), while the artificial skull may reflect an interest in decorating from the recent Halloween holiday. We surely cannot ascribe this to our stereotypes of "evil occultists" usually formed by horror films and television, and my hope is that few in the media will pick up on this in continuing media coverage of the crime. But with the prevalence of alleged "occult experts" out there, it may have a little more life left in it. Here's to also hoping that some might gain a more academically informed awareness of Western esotericism.

Update: For good Pagan perspectives on this see Star Foster's "Tragedy in AZ: Candles and Oranges Do Not an Occultist Make", and Peg Aloi's "Why must the occult be seen as evil?".

Stephen H. Webb: Heavenly Flesh and the Metaphysics of Matter

2010-12-17T16:31:00.006-07:00

For a few months now I have been working to solicit and collect essays for a special issue of Sacred Tribes Journal (hopefully for publication in the summer of 2011) that will focus on neglected issues of dialogue between Latter-day Saints and traditional Christians. This has been a slow process as those I have contacted are very busy, but a few expressions of interest, and even a submission, have trickled in. One individual who has expressed an interest is Stephen H. Webb.Webb did his PhD at the University of Chicago, and he teaches in religion and philosophy at Wabash College. If the Wikipedia entry on him is accurate, he has shifted along various Protestant backgrounds before finding a home in Roman Catholicism a few years ago.

Webb has written on various topics, including Mormonism, where he came across Robert Millet and Gerald McDermott's dialogue book Claiming Christ, found the interaction and subject matter intriguing, and wrote a piece for Reviews in Religion and Theology. This review brought him to the attention of Mormon bloggers:

http://www.mormontimes.com/article/12440/Popular-theologian-explores-Mormon-Evangelical-debate?s_cid=search_queue&utm_source=search_queue

http://summatheologica.wordpress.com/2008/06/14/stephen-h-webb-on-claiming-christ-a-mormon-evangelical-debate/

In my interactions with Webb he has let me know that he has written a book that has been accepted for publication by Oxford University Press. It is Jesus Christ, Eternal God: Heavenly Flesh and the Metaphysics of Matter, where he argues that traditional Christians can learn from Mormonism regarding the notion of divine embodiment. Indeed, he goes so far as to argue for a traditional Christian notion of God's materiality, and that orthodox Christian theology needs to reflect further on this topic. Here is the official description of the book:

If modern physics teaches us that matter is more mysterious than people used to think, could the spiritual be more material than theologians ever imagined? This book conceptualizes matter and spirit not as opposites or even contraries but as the very stuff of the eternal Jesus Christ. The result is a Christian materialism based on a new metaphysical interpretation of the incarnation. Webb provides an audacious revision of some of the deepest layers of Christian common sense with the goal of constructing a more metaphysically sound orthodoxy. Taking matter as a perfection (or predicate) of the divine requires a rethinking of the immateriality of God, the doctrine of creation out of nothing, the Chalcedonian formula of the person of Christ, and the analogical nature of religious language. It also requires a careful reconsideration of Augustine’s appropriation of the Neo-Platonic understanding of divine incorporeality as well as Origen’s rejection of anthropomorphism. Webb locates his position in contrast to evolutionary theories of emergent materialism and the popular idea that the world is God’s body. He draws on a little known theological position known as the “heavenly flesh” Christology, investigates the many misunderstandings of its origins and its relation to the Monophysite movement, and supplements it with retrievals of Duns Scotus, Caspar Scwenckfeld and Eastern Orthodox reflections on the transfiguration. Also included are discussions of classical figures like Barth and Aquinas as well as more recent theological proposals from Bruce McCormack, David Hart, and Colin Gunton. Perhaps most provocatively, the book argues that Mormonism provides the most challenging, urgent, and potentially rewarding source for metaphysical renewal today.

Webb is going to try to submit an essay that draws upon the thesis of his book, and may interact with John Bracht's book Man of Holiness (Sacred Tribes Press, 2010) discussed here previously. Frank Beckwith at Baylor University has agreed to write something for the journal as well, either interacting with Webb's essay or reviewing his book.

I hope to bring additional contributors into the mix on this special issue of the journal, and I hope that traditional Christians and Latter-day Saints will find the subject matter worthwhile for reflection and ongoing dialogue.

By Common Consent Review of New Davies Book on Mormonism

2010-12-04T16:55:00.004-07:00

The latest academic exploration of Mormonism by Douglas Davies is now available in the form of Joseph Smith, Jesus, and Satanic Opposition: Atonement, Evil and the Mormon Vision. (Ashgate, 2010). I am awaiting my review copy for Sacred Tribes Journal, but in the meantime there is an interesting review by a Latter-day Saint at the By Common Consent blog. I would draw attention to the reviewer's discussion in Davies in regards to LDS binitarianism (in contrast with evangelical foci on polytheism or henotheism), the significance of apostasy to LDS theology and ecclesiology (a factor in dialogue that serves as a reminder that while evangelical reluctance to call Mormons Christian bothers them, the significance of evangelical apostasy from their perspective is equally troubling to us), and an emphasis on folk theology (often ignored or neglected in evangelical approaches).

Chapter on Matrixism in Forthcoming Handbook of Hyper-Real Spiritualities

2010-11-18T16:32:00.004-07:00

I recently heard from Adam Possamai, editor of the Handbook of Hyper-Real Spiritualities (Brill, forthcoming), that my essay on Matrixism was accepted. It is titled “'A world without rules and controls, without borders or boundaries': Matrixism, New Mythologies, and Symbolic Pilgrimages." I am privileged to be a part of a number of top-notch contributors on new and minority religions, and hyper-real spiritualities, those religions that draw upon aspects of popular culture for metaphorical inspiration. Other topics include chapters on things like Jediism, vampirism, Heaven's Gate, Satanism, Otherkin, and the Raelian Movement.

A summary of my essay in this volume:
In this essay I draw upon the proposal of Irving Hexham and Karla Poewe regarding the significance of myth in understanding new religions, coupled with the work of other scholars who suggest that science fiction is an especially significant source of mythic inspiration for our time. Then I consider how science fiction mythic narratives provide new religions like Matrixism with the imaginative tools necessary to engage in practices similar to more traditional religions. By drawing upon Jennifer Porter’s exploration of fan participation at Star Trek conventions as a form of pilgrimage in fulfillment of an embodied ideal, combined with the thesis of Roger Aden on participation in imaginative narratives of alternative worlds that allow adherents to transcend and critique the habitus of daily life as well as grand narratives of culture, I suggest that the symbolic pilgrimage of Matrixism parallels pilgrimage as found in more traditional religions, yet also differs in that they take place primarily in the realm of the sacred imagination.

Media Stereotypes of Vampires and Other Alternative Subcultures Continue with Alleged Abduction of Teen

2010-11-04T16:43:00.007-06:00

Recently the news media reported on the October 11 disappearance of 16-year-old Shelby Ellis from Georgia, with allegations that Ellis had been abducted by an "underground vampire cult" given Her interest in the Goth movement and having visited a website with a URL that alarmed her parents. One article I read recently even went so far as to offer commentary on just how dangerous such groups are. The problem is, no such groups exist, and this media narrative was shaped by the residual effects of anti-cult stereotypes, misrepresentations of the vampire community, and the legacy of satanic panics. Beyond this, on Nov. 4 Ellis was found alive and well in Washington state.

In response to this the Atlanta Vampire Alliance issued the following statement to help correct such unfortunate media misundersandings and misrepresentations:

The Atlanta Vampire Alliance [AVA] would like to express its disappointment with the news media, both national and local, in their decision to run sensationalized headlines about the very sober and serious situation of a teenaged runaway. We urge the news media to resist the temptation of sensationalism, and employ maturity and sensitivity rather than hysteria. There is categorically no such thing as "underground vampire cults," and employing the flawed language of hysteria at best shows a lack of respect for the facts, and at worst succumbs to flights of fancy which could serve to distract an ongoing search for a missing person.

We would also like to take this opportunity to point this coverage out as "teachable moment" in media hysteria. The insistence on using the term "vampire cult" is at once prejudiced, irresponsible, and poorly-informed; it relies on a series of common folk beliefs about "cults" which have been thoroughly and repeatedly debunked by experts. They have no place in serious social dialogue of any kind, much less in a discussion about a teenager who has run away from home.

The suggestion that such "cults" exist, and are indicated by their choices of music, clothing, or non-Christian symbols, is directly related to a cultural prejudice commonly known as "Satanic Panic." Satanic Panic is an urban legend which plays on religiously-generated fears of other peoples' religions and cultures to create an imaginary narrative of "cults" which practice criminal behavior in a pseudo-religious context. No such "cults" have ever existed, and the myth of the "cults" has been repeatedly debunked; but the prejudice created by the myth still harms innocent people today.

The discredited "satanic panic" narrative stereotypes a wide range of normal behavior as potentially dangerous. These normal behaviors include choices of clothing and music, the ordinary symbols of valid non-Christian religions, and even what novels one might read. Fear of these ordinary activities has led historically to censorship and the abuse of individuals wrongly accused of being "in cults," and feeds a vicious prejudice based solely on fear.

We would also like to note that the vampirefreaks.com social networking site is not a vampire-oriented website, and is not considered a participating entity in the online vampire community. Confusing the vampirefreaks.com social networking site with vampire folklore, fiction, or the vampire community is a mistake based apparently on the site's URL. The vampirefreaks.com site, apparently in an attempt at stylishness, calls their interest-based user communities "cults." This should not be confused with any "cults," real or actual, of course. Perhaps this is where the "cult" terminology started getting tossed about the press, but if that's the case, the usage appears to be entirely facetious.

New Essay at Religion Dispatches

2010-10-29T06:29:00.003-06:00

My latest essay for Religion Dispatches is now online, titled "Evangelicals, Halloween, and the Macabre." It can be read here.

There is also another essay just posted this morning of interested, "Crying Witch: Learning From the O'Connell 'Dabbling' Debacle" by Spencer Drew.

Burning Man "Hot Academic Topic"

2010-10-28T16:05:00.003-06:00

My friend Scott Eggert recently let me know about a new academic group through Google which focuses on Burning Man Festival research. After I joined the group I noticed in one of the posted messages that there was a recent article in the Los Angeles Times titled "Burning Man becomes a hot academic topic." The byline of the story by Catherine Saillant reads "A growing number of sociologists, business professors and theologians view the event's mix of hipsters, artisans, zany theme camps and outdoor art gallery as more than a party. They see fertile ground for research."

Regular readers of this blog may recall that I wrote my MA thesis on Burning Man in 2007. The abstract:

Burning Man Festival is an intentional community and alternative cultural event involving nearly 40,000 people that meet annually in the desert of Nevada. Scholarly analysis of the festival tends to interpret it through Victor Turner’s framework of liminality and ritual. While this perspective sheds valuable light on understanding the event, other theoretical frameworks are helpful, including the “homeless mind” and secondary institutions thesis of Peter Berger, Brigitte Berger, and Hansfried Kellner used to explain the 1960s counterculture. This thesis has been updated by Paul Heelas and Linda Woodhead to include the turn to the self now involving life-enhancing secondary institutions. Hakim Bey’s Temporary Autonomous Zone also presents promising interpretive options for understanding this event. From these perspectives, Burning Man may be understood as an alternative cultural event that functions as a secondary institution and new spiritual outlet in rejection of mainstream institutions and traditional religion. The same dynamic can be seen in the historic contrast of Burning Man with other alternative cultures, such as the Rainbow Family of Living Light. Critical reflection on this phenomenon by Christians engaged in ecclesiological reflexivity provides a means for a better understanding of alternative cultural events, and possibly the revitalization and renewed credibility of Christianity in the post-Christendom West.

Christians and Satanists Clash in Oklahoma City

2010-10-27T15:54:00.002-06:00

Recently a controversy has brewed between satanists and Christians in Oklahoma City where the satanists performed a ritual mocking Christian exorcism at the Oklahoma City civic center. A strange example of the clash of religions in the public square described in several news clips from local television stations. A number of video clips at YouTube show additional Christian reaction to the ritual but do not include an embed feature. Search YouTube under "Oklahoma satanist ritual" for news reports on how this controversy developed:

Group to Have Satanic Ritual at Oklahoma City's Civic Center - Watch the top videos of the week here

Religion Dispatches: Evangelicals, Hindus, and Yoga

2010-10-27T09:09:00.003-06:00

There is a thought provoking essay in the recent Religion Dispatches by Andrea R. Jain titled "Is Downward Dog the Path to Hell?". The essay touches on the controversy in evangelical circles over the popularity of yoga in America and the West, evangelical opposition to the practice, and the formation of evangelical alternatives to it. This kind of critique is not new to evangelicalism, even if the national attention it is receiving is. But what is surprising in this essay is that fundamentalist Hindus are united with evangelicals in their concern, albeit for very different reasons.

With this post it is not my intention to weigh in on whether the practice of yoga by evangelicals are permissible or not, but rather, to note other implications that follow from Jain's piece. Following are some excerpts from Jain's article which I found significant for evangelical reflection:

"But this attempt to produce a monolithic vision of yoga ignores the fact that it, like religion itself, is anything but a stable phenomenon. Yoga has a long history whereby adherents of numerous religions, including Hindu, Jain, and New Age traditions, have constructed and reconstructed it anew. Even Hindu forms of yoga vary widely in ideology and practice. Thus yoga does not belong to Hinduism nor any other monolithic tradition.

"But evangelical Christians have an odd bedfellow in the argument for a monolithic vision of yoga as Hindu: some Hindus. They reflect the same ahistorical, religiously fundamentalist tendencies but with an entirely different agenda. The two agree that yoga is Hindu and that its global popularity is a bad thing. But rather than argue that yoga’s popularity is bad because it is incompatible with Christianity, they claim that non-Hindu yogis fail to give Hinduism credit for being the tradition from which yoga arose.

"Both the evangelical Christian yogaphobic position and the Hindu essentialist yoga-belongs-to-Hinduism position reflect religious fundamentalist tendencies to define ideas and practices not as human constructs that are subject to change over time, but as monolithic stable products that belong in specific traditions and accordingly do not belong in others."

The ideas included in the above paragraphs must be factored into evangelical analysis of yoga as a practice, both in terms of a proper understanding of it, as well as in assessing its (im)permissibility as a practice for Christians.

Further along in the essay Jain draws attention to yoga's place in the West as a part of consumer culture, with its underlying metaphysical concerns, and specifically as a practice which draws upon the idea of the sacralized body. She writes:

"In this new phase of capitalism, the attainment of physical fitness transcends the mere exchange of capital for material goods. Physical fitness is sacred. Modern yoga fits right in with this socio-historical context. In other words, modern yoga is a reflection, not of “spooky” Hindu gods or “demonic” practices, but of our contemporary culture’s tendency to envelope physical fitness into the sacred routine of self-development."

My hope is that evangelicals will not get bogged down by Jain's dismissal of concerns over "spooky" religious aspects of yoga, but will pause to consider that perhaps we have lost a sense of the body as sacred.

Whether evangelicals accept the legitimacy of yoga as a practice compatible with Christianity, Jain's essay provides food for thought in a variety of other contexts.

Related posts:

"Positioning Yoga"

"Transcendent in America: Hindu-Inspired Meditation Movements as New Religion"

Understanding Paranormal America

2010-10-16T14:37:00.001-06:00

Gordon Melton, author of The Vampire Book: The Encyclopedia of the Undead, 3rd ed. (Visible Ink Press, 2010), made me aware of a new book that presents a sociological look at the paranormal and the cultures that surround it. The book is Paranormal America: Ghost Encounters, UFO Sightings, Bigfoot Hunts, and Other Curiosities in Religion and Culture, by Christopher Bader, F. Mencken, and Joseph Baker (NYU Press, 2010). The book's website includes the following description:

Paranormal America provides the definitive portrait of Americans who believe in or have experienced such phenomena as ghosts, Bigfoot, UFOs, psychic phenomena, astrology, and the power of mediums. However, unlike many books on the paranormal, this volume does not focus on proving or disproving the paranormal, but rather on understanding the people who believe and how those beliefs shape their lives.

Drawing on the Baylor Religion Survey, a multi-year national random sample of American religious values, practices, and behaviors, as well as extensive fieldwork including joining hunts for Bigfoot and spending the night in a haunted house, authors Christopher Bader, F. Carson Mencken, and Joseph Baker shed light on what the various types of paranormal experiences, beliefs, and activities claimed by Americans are; whether holding an unconventional belief, such as believing in Bigfoot, means that one is unconventional in other attitudes and behaviors; who has such experiences and beliefs and how they differ from other Americans; and if we can expect major religions to emerge from the paranormal.

Brimming with engaging personal stories and provocative findings, Paranormal America is an entertaining yet authoritative look at a growing segment of American religious culture.

And a couple of endorsement statements/reviews:

"An essential text for our ongoing consideration of the esoteric realm... This work assembles in a very accessible and readable form all the sociological data currently available on the public's acceptance of experiences of unusual psychic experiences, our growing toleration of some extraordinary claims about the existence of UFOs, mysterious animal species, and ghostly apparitions, and our quiet dabbling in things occult. This volume has created a foundation for all future inquires."

-- J. Gordon Melton, author of Melton's Encyclopedia Of American Religions

"Paranormal America is an authoritative but extremely readable analysis of an important but often ignored subculture. This fine book explains how many people seek personally-relevant meaning in a chaotic and often alienating world. In these pages we learn much not only about believers in ESP, Bigfoot, and astrology, but also about the general ways in which all human minds make sense of our perplexing position in the universe."

-- William Bainbridge, author of Across the Secular Abyss: From Faith to Wisdom

This book can be purchased here.See the book's official website for further reviews and information.

Druidry: Official religion in UK, and new historical and ethnographic study

2010-10-13T10:25:00.004-06:00

One of the interesting news items out of the world of Paganism came recently with the announcement that Druidry had been officially recognized as a religion in the UK. The Telegraph reported on this event:

"The Druid Network has been given charitable status by the Charity Commission for England and Wales, the quango that decides what counts as a genuine faith as well as regulating fundraising bodies.

It guarantees the modern group, set up in 2003, valuable tax breaks but also grants the ancient religion equal status to more mainstream denominations. This could mean that Druids, the priestly caste in Celtic societies across Europe, are categorised separately in official surveys of religious believers.
Supporters say the Charity Commission’s move could also pave the way for other minority faiths to gain charitable status."

In connection with this event I am pleased to recommend the new ebook by Michael Cooper, Contemporary Druidry: A Historical and Ethnographic Study (Sacred Tribes Press, 2010).

ISBN: 978-1-4524-7132-7
Download Sample Chapter: Chapter One
Price: $10.99

Dr. Michael York, professor (retired) of sociology of religion at Bath Spa University College and author of Pagan Theology: Paganism as a World Religion (New York University Press, 2003).

"Michael T. Cooper’s Contemporary Druidry: A Historical and Ethnographic Study is a profoundly sensitive account of a pagan identity from an Evangelical Christian researcher. The work amounts to an interfaith breakthrough. Not only a sympathetic and enlightening understanding of Druidry itself, but Cooper also manages to open the possibilities of intellectual and empathetic exchange between a pagan position and a Christian one. Comfortably grounded with a balance of sociological tools and understandings, Cooper’s remarkably human and informative narrative holds appeal to the insider as well as outsider, to the generally curious as well as those with specific interest. . . . In all, this intelligently and well-written study of the Celtic Druid faith is one to be highly recommended."

The book can be purchased and downloaded in a variety of formats here.

PBS Frontline - God in America

2010-10-11T15:56:00.001-06:00

Watch the full episode. See more FRONTLINE.

From the PBS.org website:

How has religious belief shaped American history? What role have religious ideas and spiritual experience played in shaping the social, political and cultural life of what has become the world's most religiously diverse nation?
Religious Knowledge Quiz

For the first time on television, God in America, a presentation of AMERICAN EXPERIENCE and FRONTLINE, will explore the historical role of religion in the public life of the United States. The six-hour series, which interweaves documentary footage, historical dramatization and interviews with religious historians, will air over three consecutive nights on PBS beginning Oct. 11, 2010.

God in America examines the potent and complex interaction between religion and democracy, the origins of the American concept of religious liberty, and the controversial evolution of that ideal in the nation's courts and political arena. The series considers the role religious ideas and institutions have played in social reform movements from abolition to civil rights, examining the impact of religious faith on conflicts from the American Revolution to the Cold War, and how guarantees of religious freedom created a competitive American religious marketplace. It also explores the intersection of political struggle and spiritual experience in the lives of key American historical figures including Franciscan Friars and the Pueblo leader Po'pay, Puritan leader John Winthrop and dissident Anne Hutchinson, Catholic Bishop John Hughes, abolitionist Frederick Douglass, Presidents Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln, reform Rabbi Isaac Meyer Wise, Scopes trial combatants William Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow, evangelist Billy Graham, civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Moral Majority's Jerry Falwell.

"The American story cannot be fully understood without understanding the country's religious history," says series executive producer Michael Sullivan. "By examining that history, God in America will offer viewers a fresh, revealing and challenging portrait of the country."

To extend the reach of the series beyond the television screen, God in America has formed strategic partnerships with The Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion & Public Life, The Freedom Forum First Amendment Center, the Fetzer Institute, Sacred Space International and other organizations. An integrated multimedia campaign set to launch six months prior to broadcast will include community engagement activities, media events and a comprehensive God in America Web site. The campaign will deepen public understanding of religion and spiritual experience in the life of the nation by encouraging the public to explore the history of their own religious communities and their individual spiritual journeys.

"Americans are awash in a sea of faith, but their knowledge about religious faiths and religious history often runs as shallow as their commitment to religion runs deep," notes Stephen Prothero, chief editorial consultant for God in America, professor of religion at Boston University, and author of Religious Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know -- And Doesn't. "A series like God in America can help correct that imbalance and provide the basis for a common understanding of the role religion has played in American public life."

God in America is an AMERICAN EXPERIENCE/FRONTLINE co-production, headed by series executive producer Michael Sullivan, series producer Marilyn Mellowes, series director David Belton, and producer/directors Greg Barker and Sarah Colt. The executive producer for FRONTLINE is David Fanning. The executive producer for AMERICAN EXPERIENCE is Mark Samels.

Media and Law Enforcement "Drinking the Kool-Aid?"

2010-10-04T16:22:00.003-06:00

Julie Ingersoll of the University of North Florida has an interesting article in Religion Dispatches titled "Did We Drink the Kool-Aid in 'Suicide Cult' Disappearance?". The article looks at the way the media responded recently to the California Prayer Group which "disappeared" for a short period while the media and law enforcement feared the group would commit mass suicide. Ingersoll draws attention to the "suicide cult" template that the media and law enforcement are quick to view minority religions through and notes its connection to the anti-cult movement. Although Ingersoll's essay is missing the important distinction between the secular anti-cult movement which focuses on "deed not creed" and the evangelical "counter-cult" movement which focuses on doctrine, nevertheless it does point out the importance of understanding the framework from which new religions view the world, a framework that rarely conforms to the suicide cult template.

Pre-emptive Quote on Halloween

2010-09-30T15:47:00.002-06:00

Tomorrow is October 1, and with this month comes an increased focus on Halloween by evangelicals. Radio programs, websites, and books will raise serious concerns about the holiday, and the things they usually associate with it. In order to get a jump on the critique I present the following quote by historian Ronald A. Hutton from his book The Stations of the Sun: A History of the Ritual Year in Britain (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), 383-4.

"An attack upon the celebration of Hallowe'en, especially in schools, correspondingly developed in the late 1980s, and continues at the time of writing ... It has been organized by evangelical groups in Protestant denominations ... and rests upon two arguments. The first is that Hallowe'en is a glorification or glamorization of evil powers. The second is that it is essentially unchristian ... a Christian feast of the dead is thoroughly embedded in the history of Hallowe'en and that its legacy is usually impossible to distinguish from that of paganism in the practices and associations of the night. It is of course maintained by what is still by far the largest of the world's churches, the Roman Catholic. To describe the feast as fundamentally unchristian is therefore either ill-informed or disingenuous."

Pew Forum: U.S. Religious Knowledge Quiz

2010-09-29T16:20:00.006-06:00

The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life recently released the results of their U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey:

"Atheists and agnostics, Jews and Mormons are among the highest-scoring groups on a new Pew Forum survey of religious knowledge, outperforming evangelical Protestants, mainline Protestants and Catholics on questions about the core teachings, history and leading figures of major world religions."

In many ways there is nothing new in this as it is part of the problem of religious illiteracy in America as individuals know little of other religions, including their own. See my previous discussion of this topic with Stephen Prothero. What is surprising is to find Mormons scoring higher than evangelicals with the former tending to emphasize the Book of Mormon and other LDS scriptures rather than the Bible in their devotional life.

Pew's discussion of the survey can be read here, and the quiz can be taken here. The Salt Lake Tribune contacted me for a local perspective on this issue in Utah, particularly as it relates to Mormons and evangelicals. See the article by Peggy Fletcher Stack for quotes and perspectives of evangelicals, Mormons, and atheists.

New Issue of Evangelical Interfaith Dialogue

2010-09-21T12:25:00.002-06:00

Evangelical Interfaith Dialogue, Issue 1.3 (Summer 2010) is now available for download. It includes a description of and interaction with Richard Mouw's ideas related to convicted civility in relation to interreligious dialogue. The issue can be downloaded through the journal's web page.

Skepticism Over O'Donnell's Witchcraft "Dabbling"

2010-09-19T12:47:00.006-06:00

See my essay on this topic in Religion Dispatches.

Religion Dispatches Essay - "I Believe You're Wrong: The Trouble With Tolerance"

2010-09-16T16:20:00.004-06:00

I co-authored an essay with Charles Randall Paul of the Foundation for Interreligious Diplomacy titled "I Believe You're Wrong: The Trouble with Tolerance" with the tagline "A personal recipe for peaceful co-resistence with religious rivals." The essay appears in Religion Dispatches, and it represents a unique effort by a Protestant and Mormon scholar coming together to address religious disputation in the public square with the New York City Muslim community center and mosque controversy as the application.

Tension Among Evangeicals Over Beck "Off the Reservation"

2010-09-15T11:10:00.006-06:00

Julie Ingersoll, Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Florida, has an interesting article in Religion Dispatches titled "Evangelical Tells Beck He's 'Off the Reservation'". The article describes a recent episode of an evangelical radio program hosted by Brannon Howse who expressed concerns that radio talk show host and Fox Television host Glenn Beck is trying to lead folks astray and into Mormonism. Howse is quoted as expressing his concerns in this way:

"He has swerved into theological and doctrinal realm in the last few weeks. He’s said things on the air that makes my skin crawl. . . a ‘works based’ theology that is based in Mormonism. . . . We are not serving the god of Mormonism that says you can be like God… a religion that said Jesus and Satan were brothers. . . . Leave your pagan—your cult—religion. . . ."

Of course, it didn't help that Howse's guest was Ed Decker, an extreme member of the evangelical counter-cult community with the organization Saints Alive who has specialized in painting caricatures of Mormonism, literally in the case of his film The Godmakers which used animation (an art form associated with children's entertainment in the West) to depict Mormon sacred history and beliefs.

Howse has gone even further on his website, arguing that Beck is not only opening the door for seduction by Mormonism, but Paganism as well. He continues his warning for fellow evangelicals.

Even so, many evangelicals like Howse seem to be willing to set aside theological differences for now given agreement over the political and moral state of the country. However, it remains to be seen how long this will last, and whether the Ed Deckers and Kirk Camerons of Protestant evangelicalism and fundamentalism will become more vocal and issue calls for these camps to distance themselves from Beck.

This interesting situation is part of a historical animosity between evangelicals and Mormons, which may have been tempered in recent years by the decline of the religious right, younger evangelicals who find doctrinal disagreement with other religions a lower social priority than a previous generation of evangelicals, the ongoing evangelical-Mormon dialogue, and a greater willingness to allow political agreement to have priority over theological disagreement. With a possible Mitt Romney presidential bid it will be interesting to see how the Beck phenomenon plays a part as a backdrop.

Forthcoming Book on Sacred Folly

2010-09-11T15:26:00.005-06:00

A friend and ministry colleague of mine attended Burning Man Festival recently and has been posting his photos and a few observations on his Facebook profile. The latest profile update mistakenly identified Burning Man as neo-pagan, and asked why the festival included a strong emphasis on festivity. This has led to my posting several comments on my own in response, correcting the claim that Burning Man is neo-pagan, and borrowing from an argument by Peter Berger in A Rumor of Angels that play and festival can serve as a "signal of transcendence."

Today I received an email from Max Harris informing me of his book Sacred Folly: A New History of the Feast of Fools (Cornell University Press, forthcoming). This book will update and correct remarks Harris has made previously about the Feast of Fools in his book Carnival and Other Christian Festivals: Folk Theology and Folk Performance (University of Texas Press, 2003). As I have argued previously in my masters thesis on Burning Man, and in several posts on this blog, western evangelicalism would do well to reflect on the importance of festival and play in connection with ecclesiology and worship and how the historical Feast of Fools, properly understood in its historical and ecclesiological contexts in the past, might be recontextualized in certain subcultural contexts for the present.

See my previous interview with Harris on Carnival and Other Christian Festivals here. Related to Harris's forthcoming book is his article "A Reassessment of the Feast of Fools: A Rough and Holy Liturgy," See also my post "Burning Man and Play Theology."

Christian Clashes in the Public Square: New Theologies of Religious Disputation

2010-09-09T18:23:00.003-06:00

Religious conflict has dominated the national discourse for several weeks. For a while now the proposed building of a Muslim community center and mosque in lower Manhattan has dominated national airwaves of radio and television. But the last few weeks have seen a shift of discussion to a focus on a small church in Gainesville, Florida where Pastor Terry Jones planned on burning Quran’s on September 11 as a protest to the Muslim world. As this post was written news broke that Pastor Jones canceled the controversial event.

Public clashes between Christians and those of other religions is, of course, not merely an American phenomenon. A while ago the Associated Press reported that a group of Evangelical Christians attacked a group of voodou practitioners in Haiti as they gathered publicly to pray, sing, and conjure spirits in order to make offerings. According to their report Christians shouted at the voodou practitioners, threw rocks, and urinated on the voodoo objects. Whether the New York City controversy, or that of Haiti, surely emotional considerations are at play, with the former coming from the damage to the national psyche as a result of the terrorist attacks of 9/11, and the latter in response to a natural disaster. But something else may be at work here. In an increasingly pluralistic world, adherents of various religious pathways are encountering each other as never before, and at times these encounters result in a clash of ideas. Recent examples of this clash between Christianity and other religious traditions provide opportunities to reflect on attitudes and theologies toward other religions.

Concerning the reactions of the Christian converts from voodou in attacking the artifacts of their former religion, at times converts react strongly to the religion of their past in light of new religious commitments. We see a similarly strong public statement made by those who converted to Christianity out of ancient magical traditions in Acts 19:19. It should be noted that this passage was used by Pastor Terry Jones as the scriptural foundation for his plans to burn Qurans. But a careful reading of this passage demonstrates that the pastor and his congregation engaged in a misreading. In the Acts passage the new Christian converts burned their own implements of their former religious ways as a result of a public statement about their new faith in relation to the old. The Christians who led them to embrace a new religious pathway did not burn their magical texts as a means of protest or a form of evangelism. Beyond this Christians might also consider that the New Testament also points out that it is possible to maintain a good witness and to do so without blaspheming the deities of other religions, or desecrating their religious items, and that this can provide a positive testimony for the gospel (Acts 19:37).

It is likely that clashes between American Christians and members of other religions will continue in the future for a number of reasons. But a better way forward beyond talking (or shouting) past one another, public protests, and the desecration of religious artifacts and symbols, and our theologies of conflict, involves new theologies and praxis that include respectful forms of religious disputation and dialogue.

New book: Perspectives on Post-Christendom Spiritualities

2010-09-09T18:17:00.004-06:00

Perspectives on Post-Christendom Spiritualities

Authors: Michael T. Cooper, J. Gordon Melton, Gerald R. McDermott, Ross Clifford, James Chancellor, Craig L. Blomberg, John W. Morehead, Michael L. Yoder, Stephen P. Kennedy, Terry C. Muck, Ole Skjerbaek Madsen
Cost: $22.00

This book explores perspectives on new religious movements and western spiritualities. From contributors Michael T. Cooper, J. Gordon Melton, Gerald R. McDermott, Ross Clifford, James Chancellor, Craig L. Blomberg, John W. Morehead, Michael L. Yoder, Stephen P. Kennedy, Terry C. Muck and Ole Skjerbaek Madsen there is a wealth of information provided to understand new spiritualities.

A hard copy of the book can be ordered through Morling College Press, and and an electronic book can be ordered at Sacred Tribes Press.

Patheos and the Future of Paganism

2010-08-29T08:50:00.003-06:00

Patheos has a focus on The Future of Paganism that is wrapping up as the websites feature. Several articles are of interest to me, especially the following:

"Are Solitaries the Future of Paganism?" by Helen Berger

"Gods and Geeks in the Endless American Twilight" by Christopher Knowles

"Paganism in the News" by Sarah Pike

"Paganism and the Role of Interfaith Dialogue" by Gus diZerega

"Gods and Geeks," with its look at mythological heroes in comics and pop culture will be the focus of an upcoming post at TheoFantastique. "Paganism and the Role of Interfaith Dialogue" mentions the dialogical work of myself and some of my colleagues with the Pagan community.

American Christianity, Islam, and the Public Square

2010-08-21T18:38:00.006-06:00

Franklin Graham recently made controversial statements concerning Islam that are the focus of much discussion on the Internet and in the media. The controversy arises in large measure because of the inaccuracies in Graham's portrayal of the religion. In the video clip above you can hear Stephen Prothero's response to Graham's characterization of Islam. (See my previous interview with Prothero on religious illiteracy here.)

In a related story, the media is now reporting on the Dove World Outreach Center in Florida that is planning to burn as many copies of the Qu'ran as it can find on September 11, which the church has dubbed "International Burn a Koran Day," even though the city has denied them the appropriate permit for a fire. A review of the church's website reveals a penchant for inflammatory confrontation with Islam through the phrase "Islam is of the Devil," which can be found in Pastor Terry Jones' book title, a sign in front of the church, and t-shirts with the slogan that the church is making available to others who want to support their efforts.

These episodes demonstrate at least two things. First, we need more reflexivity in the failures of those in our own religious community historically who have not lived up to the teachings of Jesus. For a sobering reminder of some of our shortcomings see Gary Laderman's recent opinion piece in Religion Dispatches, "Dangerous Religion."

Second, Evangelicals still have a long way to go in their understanding and portrayal of other religions, particularly Islam. The events of 9/11 had a traumatic effect on the national conscience, and that these events were connected to Islam makes it easy to understand how sensitivities could be heightened in regards to Islamic religion, but the misunderstanding, misrepresentation, and grotesque confrontation with Islam through the burning of its scriptures merely exacerbates negative perceptions of Christianity in the United States (not to mention the Muslim world), and further deepens our problems in the public square.

Patheos on The Future of Mormonism

2010-08-12T20:24:00.002-06:00

Patheos has a great series of articles on "The Future of Mormonism":

The Colorful LDS Future
The Future of Mormons on the Internet
Mormonism in the Academy
The Future of "Mormon Fundamentalism"
Mormon Democrats at a Crossroads
Europe and Mormon Growth
Mormon-Evangelical Dialogue: Changing for the Better
The Future of Mormon Motherhood
Mormonism in the New Century
The Next Generation of Mormon Feminism
Partnering with Our Friends from Other Faiths
Mormon Publishing, the Internet, and the Democratization of Information
The Church's Reputation: Progress, Challenges, and Opportunity
Mormons and the Bible in the 21st Century
The Challenges of (Non-existent?) Mormon Theology
Mormon Publishing: Four Trends to Watch
Mormon Studies: Catching the New Wave
The Future of Mormon Missionary Work
A World Religion (Eventually)

Inter-Disciplinary.net: Magic and the Supernatural

2010-08-12T19:36:00.003-06:00

I recently found a great network that includes a series of fascinating conferences and research topics. The network is Inter-Disciplinary.net, and following is an upcoming conference:

Magic and the Supernatural
March 17-19, 2011
Prague, Czech Republic

Bewitched. I Dream of Jeannie. The Exorcist. Charmed. Buffy. Dr. Who. Dracula. Dark Shadows. Twilight and The Twilight Zone. Sookie Stackhouse and Bill Compton. Dresden Files. Harry Potter. The fascination and appeal of magic and supernatural entities pervades societies and cultures. The continuing appeal of these characters is a testimony to how they shape our daydreams and our nightmares, as well as how we yearn for something that is “more” or “beyond” what we can see-touch-taste-feel. Children still avoid stepping on cracks, lovers pluck petals from a daisy, cards are dealt and tea leaves read.

A belief in magic as a means of influencing the world seems to have been common in all cultures. Some of these beliefs crossed over into nascent religions, influencing rites and religious celebrations. Over time, religiously-based supernatural events (”miracles”) acquired their own flavour, separating themselves from standard magic. Some modern religions such as the Neopaganisms embrace connections to magic, while others retain only echoes of their distant origins.

This inter-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary project seeks to examine issues surrounding the role and use of magic in a wide variety of societies and cultures over the course of human history. People with access to magic or knowledge of the supernatural will also be examined.

Papers, presentations, reports and workshops are invited on issues on or broadly related to any of the following themes:

~ Magic as “paranormal,” anything alleged to exist that is not explainable by any present laws of science
~ the distinctions between “magic” and “religion” and “science”
~ Magical thinking and the equation of coincidence with causality
~ Folk magic and “traditional” systems of magic
~ “Magick” and “Wicca” as religious systems in modern society
~ Witchcraft in the European context
~ “Witchcraft” and animism in African or Asian contexts
~ Magic as illusion, stagecraft, sleight-of-hand
~ Magic in modern literature (ex. Harry Potter, Harry Dresden, the saga of Middle Earth, the Chronicles of Narnia, etc.) and in traditional literatures (folk or fairy tales, legends, mythologies, etc.)
~ Magic in art and the depiction of magical creatures, practices or practitioners
~ the associations of magic with the “monstrous” or “evil;” does one imply the presence of the other?
~ the portrayal of magic, magical creatures, and magical practices or practitioners on television and in film
~ the roles or uses of magic in video games, on-line communities, role-playing games, subcultural formations and identities
~ the similarities and differences of magical creatures across societies and time periods
~ the interplay of “magic” and “religion” as well as “science”
~ the “sciences” of demonology and angelology
~ the role of divination or prophecy in societies or religions
~ the use of “natural” vs. “supernatural” explanations for world events
~ Magic and the supernatural as coping mechanisms for individuals and societies

The Steering Group also welcomes the submission of pre-formed panel proposals. 300 word abstracts should be submitted by Friday 1st October 2010. All submissions are minimally double blind peer reviewed where appropriate. If an abstract is accepted for the conference, a full draft paper should be submitted by Friday 4th February 2011. Abstracts should be submitted simultaneously to the Organising Chairs; abstracts may be in Word, WordPerfect, or RTF formats with the following information and in this order:

a) author(s), b) affiliation, c) email address, d) title of abstract, e) body of abstract

Please use plain text (Times Roman 12) and abstain from using footnotes and any special formatting, characters or emphasis (such as bold, italics or underline). We acknowledge receipt and answer to all paper proposals submitted. If you do not receive a reply from us in a week you should assume we did not receive your proposal; it might be lost in cyberspace! We suggest, then, to look for an alternative electronic route or resend.

You can learn more about the conference and submission information here.

Proselytism and religious identity theft: a key topic for interreligious dialogue

2010-07-29T21:09:00.003-06:00

Is sharing your religious faith with another in an attempt to persuade a form of identity theft? Some certainly think so. If this is not the specific objection, some in various religious or spiritual traditions certainly see proselytism as an unethical and disrespectful of the other (as my Pagan contacts have shared with me).

This important issue that needs to be part of interreligious dialogue is taken up in an article by Thomas Farr titled "Proselytism and religious identity theft" that appeared in The Washington Post. The biographical material for Farr that accompanies this article describes him as follows:

Thomas F. Farr, a former American diplomat, is Visiting Associate Professor of Religion and International Affairs at Georgetown's Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. He is also Senior Fellow at the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs, where he directs the Religion and US Foreign Policy Program.

As the article begins, Farr frames the issues and lists a number of significant questions related to the topic. He then writes:

The way these and related questions are addressed and answered will have enormous implications for American interests, justice, and world peace in the 21st century.

Farr then discusses how proselytism has gone back and forth between Christianity and Islam and eventually comes to the following conclusion:

On balance, it seems reasonable to conclude that both religion and democracy can benefit if the activity of sharing one's faith is both permitted and conducted with respect. But there is much work to do before such a conclusion is broadly accepted.

You can watch Farr discuss this topic at YouTube at this link.

I think this is a very important topic that must be addressed by adherents of various religious traditions as they come together in dialogue and consider the place that proclamation and persuasion plays in the overall dialogue process, and especially how this relates to perceptions of religious traditions of proselytism in connection with identity.

Sacred Tribes Journal, Vol. 5, No. 1 (Spring 2010)

2010-07-23T14:53:00.003-06:00

The latest edition of Sacred Tribes Journal, Volume 5, Number 1 (Spring 2010), is now available online. As the Table of Contents indicates below, this issue features an interesting article by Paul Markham on religious conversion in light of neuroscience, and a review of The Kingdom of the Occult by Douglas Cowan for those interested in new religions and Western esotericism, as well as previews of electronic books available at Sacred Tribes Press.

Editor's Introduction

Featured Article

Practicing Religious Conversion: Lessons from Neuroscience - Paul N. Markham

Special Features from Sacred Tribes Press

What Mormons Believe About God - John L. Bracht
Introduction to Apologetics, Mission and New Religious Movements - Philip Johnson
From the Occult to Western Esotericism - J. Gordon Melton

Book Reviews

The Kingdom of the Occult - Douglas E. Cowan

Call for Future Articles

International Journal of Mormon Studies Vol. 3, No. 1 (2010)

2010-07-05T18:59:00.003-06:00

The new issue of the International Journal of Mormon Studies Vol 3, No. 1 (2010) is now available online. Articles include:

Father, Jesus and Lucifer in Pre–Mortal Council by Douglas J. Davies

Meaning and Authority in Mormon Ritual by Walter E. A. van Beek

The Religious “Other”: Reflecting upon Mormon Perceptions by Mauro Properzi

The Rise of the Nazi Dictatorship and its Relationship with the Mormon Church in Germany, 1933–1939 by Steve Carter

Religious Freedom in Belgium: A Limited Study of Challenges as experienced by LDS Children and Youth in Flemish Classrooms from the 1970’s until Today by Ingrid Sherlock-Taselaar

Utah and All These Cherries: Mormonism in Fallaci’s Un cappello pieno di ciliege by Massimo Introvigne

Oriana Fallaci, the Mormons and Me: A Personal Recollection by Michael W. Homer

Poles Apart? A Look at Mormon Doctrine in Light of Historic Christianity by Johnnie Glad

Are Jesus and Satan Brothers? A Short Exploration in Mormon Christology by John Walsh

This issue also includes Front Matter, an Editorial, and Book Reviews.

James Henderson: Christian self-diagnostics

2010-06-30T13:58:00.004-06:00

A great article by kindred spirit Jim Henderson pursuing alternative ways of engaging others, in this case by interacting with atheists for their perspective on church! I especially like these two segments in the piece which need to be asked by Christians about those of all stripes in their lives:

"Atheists are also wary of being seen as "projects." Does continued contact and eventual friendship with the Christian in their life depend on them converting?"

"If you want to have influence, I said, you have to be willing to be influenced. If not, I asked, would anyone want to have a conversation with you?"

Douglas Davies' Forthcoming Book on Mormonism: Jesus, Satan and Joseph Smith

2010-06-20T15:55:00.005-06:00

Ashgate has its new catalog out in Religious Studies and Theology promoting its new titles for 2010. One that caught my eye as a forthcoming volume is Jesus, Satan and Joseph Smith: The Mormon Cosmic Triad, but listed as Joseph Smith, Jesus, and Satanic Opposition: Atonement, Evil and the Mormon Vision on Ashgate's website. The book is by Douglas Davies of the University of Durham who has written two previous volumes on Mormonism, including The Mormon Culture of Salvation (Ashgate, 2000), and An Introduction to Mormonism (Cambridge University Press, 2002):

This book explores Mormon theology in new ways from a scholarly non-Mormon perspective. Bringing Jesus and Satan into relationship with Joseph Smith the founding prophet, Douglas Davies shows how the Mormon 'Plan of Salvation' can be equated with mainstream Christianity's doctrine of the Trinity as a driving force of the faith. Exploring how Jesus has been understood by Mormons, his many Mormon identities are described in this book: he is the Jehovah of the Bible, our Elder Brother and Father, probably also a husband, he visited the dead and is also the antagonist of Satan-Lucifer.

This book offers a way into the Mormon 'problem of evil' understood as apostasy, from pre-mortal times to today. Three images reveal the wider problem of evil in Mormonism: Jesus' pre-mortal encounter with Lucifer in a heavenly council deciding on the Plan of Salvation, Jesus Christ's great suffering-engagement with evil in Gethsemane, and Joseph Smith's First Vision of the divine when he was almost destroyed by an evil force.

Douglas Davies, well-known for his previous accounts of Mormon life and thought, shows how renewed Mormon interest in theological questions of belief can be understood against the background of Mormon church-organization and its growing presence on the world-stage of Christianity.

Transcendent in America: Hindu-Inspired Meditation Movements as New Religion

2010-06-20T15:43:00.002-06:00

I just received a review copy of a new release by New York University Press, Transcendent in America: Hindu-Inspired Meditation Movements as New Religion by Lola Williamson. From the Preface:

This book is about Walter, Aaron, Jennifer, and others like them who have practiced meditation under the auspices of a Hindu guru for twenty or more years. It is also about the meditation movements in which they participate: Self-Realization Fellowship, Transcendental Meditation, and Siddha Yoga. These are three of many such movements that, taken together, comprise a new hybrid form of religion. This new religion combines aspects of Hinduism with Western values, institutional forms, modes of teaching, and religious sensibilities. Lying at the conjunction of two worldviews, this phenomenon could be called "Hindu-inspired meditation movements," or HIMMs. Through personal, historical, and cultural lenses, this book explores the contours of Hindu-inspired meditation movements and their implications for American culture.

Foundation for Interreligious Diplomacy Conference: Mormon Engagement with the World Religions

2010-06-16T15:36:00.000-06:00

Last week I had the privilege of attending the 2010 inaugural conference sponsored by the Mormon Chapter of the Foundation for Interreligious Diplomacy titled "Mormon Engagement with the World Religions: Perspectives and Possibilities with the Abrahamic Traditions." The event was held June 11-12 on the campus of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, an appropriate place for a conference on interreligious dialogue in that this location is the most religiously diverse area of the world as documented by Diana Eck of Harvard University in her Pluralism Project research.

When I first received the invitation to attend in May I was unsure if I would be able to participate. The recession has impacted my non-profit organization to the extent that no travel funds are available this year. If I was going to attend something dramatic would have to happen, and fairly quickly from the time of the invitation to the time of the event. After making my invitation known a few people came forward to assist. One colleague provided the airfare, and two individuals affiliated with the event donated my hotel room. My heartfelt thanks goes to these individuals who made my attendance and participation possible.

To provide context for the conference some background information is needed related to the founding organization, and the chapter that sponsored the conference. The Foundation for Interreligious Diplomacy (FID) was founded by Charles Randall Paul. The organization's website describes it as follows:

The Foundation is organized to promote and facilitate communication between people experiencing conflicts inspired by religious differences. It seeks to enroll and train religiously bi-lingual “interreligious diplomats” who can engage in deep dialogue encounters to decrease ill will and build trust even while in the midst of difficult conflicts.

Foundation membership affiliation is open to all persons who are willing to engage in respectful interreligious diplomatic exchanges and receive training from the Foundation. Members of the same religious or ideological persuasion are encouraged to inquire about forming chapters of the Foundation, guided by FID principles and methods but directed by local members working to achieve their goals for interreligious communication.

The Mormon Chapter was one of the first to be formed by FID, brought together under the leadership of Brian Birch who teaches at Utah Valley University. This inaugural conference by the Mormon Chapter was, as the conference invitation stated, "designed to explore various perspectives and methods for thinking about Latter-day Saints among the great traditions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. It's aim will be to connect theology with practice in allowing space for Mormons to think more carefully about the activity of interreligious exchange and the possibility of mutual transformation."

The conference involved eight sessions over the course of two days. On Friday this included "The Latter-day Saint Approach to Interreligious Relations" with a presentation by Elder Bruce D. Porter of the First Quorum of the Seventy, "Latter-day Saints and Interreligious Engagement," a session on "Judaism," and concluding the day's events with "The Grand Fundamental Principle: The Theological Question of Religious Diversity." Saturday's presentations included "The Mormon Voice in a Pluralistic Society," "Catholic and Orthodox Christianity," "Protestant Christianity," and a session on "Islam." Each session involved a panel of presenters including representatives of the religious tradition under consideration, and LDS respondents. Each presenter spoke for twenty minutes, and ten minutes were provided for audience questions and answers with the panel.

Given that I am part of the Protestant Christianity tradition I was most interested in this panel where my colleague and WIIS affiliated scholar Terry Muck of Asbury Theological Seminary was speaking. David McAllister-Wilson of Wesley Theological Seminary was another representative of this tradition, with Deidre Green from Claremont Graduate University and J. Spencer Fluhman of Brigham Young University responding. Unfortunately, the previous session went long and pushed the lunch hour back, and when this was coupled with my departure flight time I was unable to hear much of this session beyond a few minutes of Fluhman's opening remarks. Since the event's proceedings were videotaped I look forward to them being made available in the near future on the FID Mormon Chapter's website.

As to my thoughts on the conference, I believe that interreligious dialogue is an important task for representatives of all religious traditions to be able to engage in faithfully in regards to their own traditions, and effectively in terms of appropriate means of communication. In my view FID sets forth the right approach which they describe as respectful contestation. This approach avoids the two problematic extremes of liberalism and some forms of ecumenism on the one hand that dismiss the importance of truth claims (person over truth), and the other extreme of disrespectful forms of proclamation and dialogue (truth over person).

A few observations:

I was surprised and pleased to learn of Latter-day Saint efforts and successes in developing relationships and dialogue with representatives of other religious traditions that have been going on for several years. The work with Judaism and Roman Catholicism were especially interesting.

Elder Porter made a few statements that struck me as curious. At one point in the question and answer period he stated that dialogue and proselytizing were two different hats that were worn at different times. This can surely be the case, but not necessarily so, as the position of FID makes clear. Elder Porter also spoke of a uniformity of beliefs among LDS, and while the LDS Church has done a good job at providing teachings to be used throughout the Church with the aim toward this uniformity, what little scientific research I have come across in this area indicates some level of diversity, which is to be expected in a diverse population, even if there is an official and popular "center of gravity" for beliefs.

At several points during the conference I felt like a fly on the wall, and an uncomfortable one at that, as I watched and listened to another religious tradition wrestle with issues both intra- and inter- in regards to other religions. I found it refreshing that a group of Latter-day Saints was active in moving beyond its own religious community to understand and relate in the public square. Such interests compliment a faith very much interested in the process of proselytization.

If I were to offer a critique of the conference, I would like to have seen fewer people on the panel, and/or less time given to presentations so as to allow greater time with panel participants interacting with each other and the audience. In addition, I would like to have seen some incorporation of "practical" and grassroots examples of dialogue that moves beyond the institutional and academic levels to our neighborhoods.

One of the benefits of attending a conference like this is not only the event itself, but the ability to meet people, network, and develop relationships. As one example, Terry Muck and I were able to spend some time together, and we will be working with an initial group of charter members to form the Evangelical Chapter of FID. This chapter will put together an inaugural conference in the near future, and will work to equip Evangelicals to become effective participants in respectful contestation, and in the training of bi-lingual diplomats fluent in multiple religions who can engage in interreligious dialogue.

In a separate but related item, the Spring 2010 issue of Evangelical Interfaith Dialogue is available for download. This issue focuses on theologies of religions, and it features an article on the subject by Matti Kärkkäinen of Fuller Theological Seminary with a number of respondents including myself in a piece simply titled "Supplemental Reflections." Readers may enjoy this discussion of a timely theological and cultural issue as it relates to interreligious dialogue.

Christian Research Journal on Avatar: Wishing For Greater Breadth in Pop Cultural Engagement

2010-06-14T17:19:00.007-06:00

Given my interactions with the religious and cultural implications of Avatar in numerous postings on the Internet in various forums, I was intrigued to find that Christian Research Journal has an article on the subject in the latest issue of the publication, Vol. 33, No. 2 (2010). The article is titled "Avatar: A Postmodern Pagan Myth," and the piece is written by Brian Godawa. Godawa is a Christian screenwriter and author who frequently provides commentary on contemporary cinema for evangelical publications.

Given that Godawa's article appears in a publication written for an evangelical audience, and one interested in apologetic and theological forms of cultural engagement, the author's approach to his subject matter is not surprising. After summarizing the film's story Godawa moves to analysis from an evangelical apologetic perspective wherein he frames Avatar as "a postmodern pagan myth of nature worship," which includes elements of animism, polytheism, pantheism, and panentheism. Godawa concludes his article with discussion of James Cameron's abilities as a mythmaker for our time.

In my opinion Godawa's article is fine as far as it goes, and as stated above, it is not surprising to see this kind of treatment given the journal's perspective and the intended audience. However, there is a place for broadening the approach in interacting with popular culture in an effort to assist evangelicals in a broader and deeper understanding and engagement with the issues of the day. I think that Godawa's analysis falls short in the area of empathetic consideration, Christian reflexivity, and awareness of (or at least discussion of) Avatar's connection to broader cultural phenomena.

In terms of empathetic consideration, like many apologetic writings by evangelicals, Godawa's article demonstrates little by way of an attempt to sympathetically enter into the thought processes and affective dimensions of those who produced and consumed Avatar as a powerful piece of mythmaking. Numerous stories can be found of individuals who have had a deep connection with various facets of this film, from viewing the moon Pandoria as a utopia to which they wish they could escape, to those who have identified with the Na'vi as an oppressed people, to those who find a resonance with the eco-spiritual aspects of the film. Evangelicals will benefit in many ways from attempts at entering into the perspective of others as we form our understanding and critique.

An attempt at reflexivity is also absent in Godawa's analysis. Reflexivity is a process whereby the study of another culture provides the opportunity to step outside of one’s usual conceptions of cultural normality in order to not only understand another culture, but also to critically reassess one’s own culture and social location in light of the encounter with the cultural other. This stance is crucial as Gordon Lynch has stated:

"Judging popular culture on the basis of our own preformed religious and cultural assumptions, without allowing the possibility for these to be challenged or changed in some way by our study of popular culture, will not help us become better cultural critics or more thoughtful theologians."

Had Godawa adopted a reflexive stance in regards to Avatar, he and his readers might have a greater appreciation for the the claim that Christianity has played a significant role in the West's exploitation of indigenous peoples and the environment. Although this claim is often overstated in popular discussions of the subject matter, the church's failures in these areas must be acknowledged if we are to engage the post-Christendom West with credibility in the twenty-first century.

Finally, Godawa's analysis would have benefited from some discussion of the connection of the film to broader cultural phenomena. Specifically, as I have discussed elsewhere, Avatar taps into our dissatisfaction with our failed technological paradise and finds solace in a mythic narrative of indigenous peoples. Beyond this, Avatar also taps into the growing and increasingly popular eco-spirituality that Bron Taylor has called "Dark Green Religion." As discussed in a previous post, this nature religion “considers nature to be sacred, imbued with intrinsic value, and worthy of reverent care..” The reference to “dark” in connection to the green is a dual referent, with application both to the depth of commitment of those to nature religion, and also to the possibility of a “shadow side” to the religion that “could even precipitate or exacerbate violence.” By connecting Avatar's portrayal of sacred nature not only to the Gaia Hypothesis, but also to Dark Green Religion, Godawa would have helped his readers not only understand Avatar's appeal better, but also made them aware of a significant new expression of the sacred, the religious, and the spiritual.

I am pleased to see an evangelical publication interact with contemporary film, and even more so that it engages one of the most popular films of all time, but it seems to me that we evangelicals have a way to go in providing a broader consideration of this topic. Only a broader approach will help us speak beyond the evangelical tribe.

Off to a Conference on Dialogue

2010-06-09T15:52:00.003-06:00

Thursday evening I leave for a conference on interreligious dialogue to be held Friday and Saturday on the campus of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. The event is sponsored by the Mormon chapter of the Foundation for Interreligious Diplomacy and it brings together Protestant evangelicals, Roman Catholics, Jews and Muslims for the perspectives of the Abrahamic religions on dialogue with Latter-day Saints. I'll post my follow up comments on the conference next week.

New Book on Psytrance

2010-06-03T16:54:00.003-06:00

During my research on Burning Man Festival for my master of arts thesis, one of the more helpful research sources was Graham St. John. In a recent email he announced a new book he edited, The Local Scenes and Global Culture of Psytrance (Routledge, 2010):

This lively textual symposium offers a rich harvest of formative research on the culture of global psytrance (psychedelic trance). As the first book to address the diverse transnationalism of this contemporary electronic dance music phenomenon, the collection hosts interdisciplinary research attending to psytrance as a product of intersecting local and global trajectories. With coverage of scenes in Goa, the UK, Israel, Japan, Italy, the US, Portugal, The Czech Republic and Australia, the collection features a dozen chapters from scholars researching psytrance in worldwide locations, employing various methods, within multiple disciplines. With chapters offering significant contributions to our understanding of globalization and music cultures, scene demise and transformation, ephemeral and cosmopolitan assemblages, counterculture and paradox, psychedelicization and genre, virtual tribes and the Internet, the carnivalesque and the aesthetics of nonsense, festivals and the logics of sacrifice, and other topics, Psytrance will strike interest across anthropology, sociology and studies in popular music, culture, media, history and religion.

Contents

Psytrance: An Introduction. Graham St John

I Goa Trance

1. Goa is a State of Mind: On the Ephemerality of Psychedelic Social Emplacements. Luther Elliott

2. The Decline of Electronic Dance Scenes: The Case of Psytrance in Goa. Anthony D'Andrea

3. The Ghost of Goa Trance: A Retrospective. Arun Saldanha

II Global Psytrance

4. Infinite Noise Spirals: Psytrance as Cosmopolitan Emotion. Hillegonda Rietveld
5. Psychedelic Trance Music Making in the UK: Rhizomatic Craftsmanship and the Global Market Place. Charles de Ledesma
6. Re-evaluating Musical Genre in UK Psytrance. Robin Lindop
7. (En)Countering the Beat: Paradox in Israeli Psytrance. Joshua I. Schmidt

III Liminal Culture

8. DemenCZe: Psychedelic Madhouse in the Czech Republic. Botond Vitos

9. Dionysus Returns: Tuscan Trancers and Euripides' The Bacchae. Chiara Baldini
10. Weaving the Underground Web: Neotribalism and Psytrance on Tribe.net. Jenny Ryan
11. Narratives in Noise: Reflexivity, Migration and Liminality in the Australian Psytrance Scene. Alex Lambert
12. Liminal Culture and Global Movement: The Transitional World of Psytrance. Graham St John

Reviews

"Psytrance is an intriguing transnational phenomenon for anyone interested in popular music, subcultures, and alternative spiritualities and lifestyles. Although still relatively unexplored, it is an increasingly significant area of study in Sociology, Cultural Studies, Popular Music Studies and Religious Studies. A dynamic feature of a multi-faceted, global, psychedelic occulture, psytrance presents the scholar with a fascinating, if bewildering array of musicological, cultural, and spiritual confluences. Edited by Graham St John, the foremost EDMC theorist, this stimulating collection of essays by some of the key researchers in the field provides a genuinely insightful and engaging contribution to the study of psytrance, which students, tutors, and researchers will be turning to for many years to come. I warmly and enthusiastically welcome it." Christopher Partridge, Lancaster University

"The Local Scenes and Global Culture of Psytrance is a rich collection, full of pieces that combine the results of detailed fieldwork with up-to-date theorizing. I particularly like the way this volume goes beyond the longstanding preoccupation of popular music scholars with subcultural expression, and into a whole set of other, interdisciplinary issues. This book is very much about music, but it also tackles such phenomena as the global "festivalization" of culture, emerging forms of music-based religiosity, transformations in the nature of cultural labour, and shifts in the social meaning of travel. Psytrance comes across here as much more than just one more interesting musical niche. Interweaving technologies and bodies, the archaic and the contemporary, the local and the cosmopolitan, psytrance condenses within itself many of the key cultural dynamics of our time. The articles gathered here delve into those dynamics with skill and commitment, and the result is a book that should interest any scholar of present-day cultural expression." --Will Straw, McGill University

Teen Wolf: For Real

2010-05-30T15:05:00.011-06:00

I came across an interesting item at the science fiction website io9 with a post titled "Teens pretending to be werewolves." You will see the news report out of San Antonio, Texas accompanying this post that describes a group of teens who identify with werewolves and gather in groups they call packs. When I came across this item I wondered whether this had any relationship to the Otherkin, those individuals who consider themselves to be something other than human. Perhaps, or it may be something that overlaps with it without being a part of this interesting pop culture phenomenon. At any rate, it is an indication of the power of fantastic mythic creatures in identity formation in late modernity.

Related posts:

"Rethinking the Sacred and Profane"

"Joseph Laycock: Vampires Today"

Announcing Sacred Tribes Press

2010-05-14T18:14:00.005-06:00

I am pleased to announce that the website for Sacred Tribes Press is now ready for review as we continue to develop and add titles for electronic publication. As the website description states:

"Welcome to Sacred Tribes Press, an evangelical, economical and environmentally friendly academic publisher. Sacred Tribes Press is a partnership between Sacred Tribes Journal and the Western Institute for Intercultural Studies. Out of a desire to make quality academic resources available to students and academics, Sacred Tribes Press utilizes innovative technology to provide electronic books at affordable prices without impacting the environment. Powered by Amazon.com's Kindle, our books are available for download to a Kindle reader, PC, iPhone, or iPad. Whether in the classroom, airplane, beach or mountains you can take a Sacred Tribes Press book easily wherever you go.

"Not only are we concerned with quality economical texts that do not leave a footprint on the environment, we are also committed to giving back to society. Ten percent of our book sales go to various non-profit organizations whose focus is on sustainable development in the poorest of places. So, buy our books, help the environment and meet the needs of the marginalized. Please tell others about us as well."

The site can be viewed at www.sacredtribespress.com. Here you will find our initial listing of books with others in process and on the way. Please let others know about this website and publishing venue, and also if you have written projects of your own that you would like to see published in the new and growing venue of electronic publishing please consider submitting your text to us.

Earth Day and Special Theme Issue of Sacred Tribes Journal: Dark Green Religion Dialogue

2010-04-22T16:32:00.004-06:00

Since today is Earth Day is seems fitting to announce that I am working as project coordinator and editor for a special theme issue of Sacred Tribes Journal. This issue brings together a handful of Christian scholars, including Loren Wilkinson, who will interact with Bron Taylor and his important book Dark Green Religion. The interaction will involve a level of dialogue as the participants discuss issues related to this significant eco-spirituality. This special theme issue is scheduled for publication by the end of 2010. My hope is that this issue makes an important contribution to spirituality and the environment, and that it might be but the first such dialogue for these individuals with an additional goal of widening the conversation partners.

Bodily Perfection as New Religion?

2010-04-21T14:26:00.006-06:00

Religion Dispatches includes an interesting article by Jeremy Biles titled "I Want a Perfect Body: Is Plastic Surgery a Religious Rite of Passage?". With America's obsession over the body in a never ending quest for "beauty" this article raises interesting food for thought:

"Though it may be a global phenomenon, the roots of this fixation on the body may lie partly in American religion. We need only think of America's many corporeal obsessions, from dieting, to fitness crazes, to cosmetic surgery, to begin to suspect that beliefs and commitments at the very heart of American culture are at work here. Harvard's R. Marie Griffith argues that religion, specifically Protestant forms of Christianity, has been a key influence on the conception and creation of American bodies. Protestant ascetic expressions of Christianity, Griffith argues, promote what she calls "corporeal acts of devotion." Griffith traces shifting Christian conceptions of embodiment from these early modern Protestant roots through Christian Scientism and the New Thought Movement. The emphasis on manifesting the inner, spiritual self through disciplines shaping the outer, physical self has thrust the body to the forefront of the American imagination."

Easter and the Resurrection Mythic Archetype

2010-04-03T18:21:00.004-06:00

At the conclusion of Holy Week for Christians comes Easter and the celebration of the Resurrection of Christ. With this post I share a post that brings together reflections on the Resurrection as it intersects with aspects of contemporary Western culture. In this instance it is a summary of Leon McKenzie's thesis from his very helpful book Pagan Resurrection Myths and the Resurrection of Jesus. It is presented for readers from a variety of religious traditions and perspectives to reflect on:

Following publication of several recent books characterizing Jesus' resurrection as just another myth - the most prominent written by A.N. Wilson (1992), Barbara Thiering (1992), and Episcopal bishop John Spong (1994) - it was bound to happen that disavowals of the resurrection would make it to the Internet. "If you believe in the resurrection," barked one message, "have I got a bridge to sell you!"

Most who deny Jesus' resurrection base their speculations, consciously or inadvertently, on the assumptions of a philosophical naturalism that rejects any supernatural dimension of reality. Any interpretation admitting the possibility of the actual resurrection of Jesus from the dead is ruled out before speculation begins. How explain, then, the New Testament accounts? Those who deny the resurrection fall back on the "nothing but" fallacy in their arguments.

We are instructed the resurrected Jesus is "nothing but" another dying and rising god in a long line of mythic gods. This "nothing but" reductionism is noted very briefly here to enable readers to evaluate anti-resurrection writings more critically. More importantly in this electronic essay, the origin of pagan resurrection myths is clarified with some interesting results.

The characterization of Jesus' resurrection as a myth must be evaluated only after a thorough consideration of the genesis of myths of so-called dying and reviving gods. The fruitfulness of such a study, of course, is dismissed a priori by those who reject the resurrection because of their ideological presuppositions.

The modern secular imagination in this instance is prejudiced to such a degree that the analysis of the origin of fabled deaths and risings is considered a waste of time. The origins of the myths has already been "discovered" by rationalist-secularist scholars. Nothing more needs to be added. The resurrection of Jesus is a myth, they say. Case closed.

It is my thesis that the resurrection of Jesus is not explainable by mythic fables of dying and reviving gods. On the contrary, mythic resurrection stories make sense only in the light of the resurrection of Jesus. To develop this proposal, it is necessary to begin with the notion of the resurrection archetype.

The Resurrection Archetype

Carl Jung wrote of a resurrection archetype. I do not use the concept precisely in a Jungian sense. For me, the resurrection archetype is a meaning structure in the human psyche based on universal human experience. It is not something innate as Jung averred. Nor is the resurrection archetype limited to psychological applications.

The archetype is associated principally with the Christian imagination in that it supports and energizes the Christian imagination. (This is something Jung would never have admitted). This meaning structure, furthermore, is the primary model for the death-revival myths of antiquity. The resurrection archetype began developing in the memory of the human race, I suggest, from ancient times. Resurrection myths also began emerging early on out of this archetypal matrix.

Experience of the resurrection theme in the natural world led to the formation of a resurrection archetype in the collective unconscious of the human race. This archetype is the source of myths of dying and reviving pagan gods. All in all, in God's providence the resurrection archetype prepared human beings for God's decisive action within human history: the bodily resurrection of Jesus from death. This thesis requires further elaboration.

The Resurrection Theme in the Created World

Out of what frequently repeated human experiences did the resurrection archetype originate? There are at least seven major and often-occurring phenomena that shaped our collective unconscious. "Death and resurrection" themes were associated by the ancients with: 1) vegetation; 2) the sun and climate on an annual basis; 3) the sun on a daily basis; 4) constellations in the night skies; 5) awakened states from sleep; 6) tribal fortunes; and 7) human moods.

Many other resurrection motifs manifest themselves in the created world. It is relatively easy to identify these motifs when someone begins looking for them. The seven listed here seem to be the most significant.

Seven Resurrection Themes

Vegetation

Concern for the success of the harvest in ancient times was suffused with a powerful sense of wonder. Not much was known about why things died and grew again. All that was known was that the planting - the burial - of seeds in the Spring conduced later to a harvest, if other conditions such as weather were congenial. For the pagans (our ancestors who were also God's children), if the gods took care to "resurrect" mere buried seeds, might the gods not also be solicitous for dead members of the tribe who were buried? One of the effects of this focus on the mysteries of the decay and growth of vegetation was the construction of the resurrection archetype.

Climate

It did not take long for our ancient ancestors to associate agricultural cycles with climatic cycles. When the sun seemed to die at the end of the year, vegetation also died. The death and resurrection of the crops had something to do with the annual death and resurrection of the sun god. Did the death and rising again of the sun god on a yearly basis have anything to do with the genesis of the resurrection archetype? I think this repeated universal human experience helped fashion the meaning structure we call the resurrection archetype.

The Daily Death and Rising of the Sun

The sun god died and lived again, on an annual basis. The sun god also died every evening and arose again every morning, according to the perceptions of ancient peoples. The demise of the solar disk and its reappearance each day must have had a tremendous impact in the unconscious realms of the human psyche. This daily reminder of the death and resurrection of the powerful sun etched the resurrection archetype in the collective unconscious of the human race.

Stellar Phenomena

One of the great pastimes of the ancient world was the study of the night skies. Navigators, shepherds and sages marveled at the starry vault. They took particular interest in the constellations. A constellation is a configuration of relatively bright stars based on imaginary figures. These constellations, at particular seasons and from particular perspectives on the earth, died each night but were born again on the following night. The wonders of the night skies disclosed - as so many other experiences revealed - the resurrection motif in the cosmos. The resurrection archetype that came into being was based on our ancient ancestors' reflective experience of repeated resurrection patterns in nature.

Sleep and Wakefulness

Sleep has been compared to death in many literary works. We lose our consciousness in sleep and regain it when we wake. During thousands of years this pattern of losing oneself in sleep and gaining a new, refreshed self in the morning, has been an essential component of shared human experience. Sleep and the awakening from sleep reinforced the emergence of the resurrection archetype. This experience of the death and resurrection motif each night and morning was a powerful occasion for the development of the resurrection archetype.

Tribal Fortunes

For untold years every tribe and/or local community experienced the wane and wax of good fortune. Durations of drought or defeat in battle could mean the death of an entire community. A fruitful harvest or victory in tribal combat could mean literally the continuation of the life of the community. The community was especially important in the ancient world. Without a community a person could not live physically or emotionally. Rugged individualism was unthinkable. The making of the resurrection archetype was something that affected everyone.

Mood Changes

The world each of us sees each day depends to a certain extent on our moods. Our moods, Martin Heidegger claimed, affect our very being-in-the-world. If I have a dark mood, the world appears to be a melancholy place. When my mood changes from sad to glad, the world becomes a joyful place. The taste of renewal that comes from a sad to glad mood change may well be compared to a sense of deliverance from the belly of the beast. This taste of "death" and "resurrection" in respect to moods may be likened to a foretaste of one's own resurrection. Even mood changes, then, contributed to the formation of the resurrection archetype.

Pagan Myths as Proleptic

The resurrection archetype has been operative for unnumbered ages in the psyche of the race. This archetype exerted a great influence over tribal myth makers and story tellers. This fact is central to any informed understanding of the origin of myths of death and revival. Sometimes such myths were constructed around the deeds of a local hero who brought great boons to the community after undergoing severe tests. That is, years after the death of a local hero, myth makers embellished his legend with stories of some kind of revival from the dead.

This, according to the late Joseph Campbell, is the great monomyth, the myth that sums up the lesson of all myths. Later, the myths were redacted and retold regionally. Some of the myths of so-called dying and rising gods became accepted by entire peoples in larger geographical areas.

Pagan revival myths, in their own ways, prepared the way for the message of Jesus' resurrection from the dead. The word prolepsis is attributed to anything that represents a future event as if it had already taken place. Myths of dying and reviving pagan gods (which are essentially different from the announcement of Jesus' resurrection in crucial ways), were products of the common human experience of the death and resurrection themes manifested in the natural world.

The death and rebirth myths about the gods, it was noted, are essentially different from the heralding of Jesus' resurrection. First, the resurrection of Jesus occurred at a particular time and place in history; stories of gods are ahistorical, they happened "once upon a time." Secondly, there is a "fairy tale" character identifiable in all revival myths, i.e., these myths are saturated with elements of the fantastic. The resurrection of Jesus may be construed legitimately as wondrous, but is certainly not certifiably ridiculous as are the myths. Those who state Jesus is "nothing but" a mythic hero certainly have not studied hero myths critically.

Finally, the effects of the heralding of Jesus' resurrection are well known after two millennia. The Good News has had staying power and produced powerfully good consequences for humankind. The myths of Attis, Adonis, Osiris, Dionysus, and others are hardly known and the fruits of these myths are nonexistent. One would be hard put to identify a hospital dedicated to the memory of Attis.

Yet something good can be said about the myths that grew out of the thematic resurrectional structure of the natural world via the resurrection archetype. Pagan myths, always enormously ambiguous and often morally disreputable, nonetheless pointed the way obscurely - by way of hint and insinuation - to the key event of history, the resurrection of Jesus.

The Credibility of the Kerygma

When people heard the Good News heralded for the first time, many were moved by the ideas and images of the resurrection archetype - under the prompting of the Holy Spirit - to affirm the message they heard. They might well have said to themselves, "Yes, the announcement of the resurrection of Jesus is in accord with what I have sensed deep down in my heart all of my life. Also, the resurrection of the Son of God seems very real because of the intimations contained in ancient myths that preceded Jesus' resurrection. These myths were faint and garbled whispers of what was to occur at a central point in history. The resurrection of Jesus is worthy of belief because of the truthfulness of those who bear the message and because the message itself has about it the ring of truth. The Good News finds resonance in my soul. The resurrection of Jesus validates my lifelong experience of the world and the seeming 'messages' the world has often spoken to me."

A young man once stated at a conference that he accepted God and morality, but could not accept the resurrection of Jesus since it was redolent of ancient structures of imagination and thinking. The resurrection of Jesus may be unacceptable to some because it evokes ancient meaning structures at a time when only the newest ideas are assumed to be correct. The resurrection of Jesus, however, would be unacceptable to many of us, if it was not redolent of ancient meaning structures.

The same God who raised Jesus from the dead is the God who created the ancient structures of imagining and thinking. He is the same God who filled the cosmos with images of death and resurrection and enabled us to interpret these images in terms of Jesus' resurrection.

Why Resurrection Motifs in Nature?

There remains one more interesting question raised by this brief summary. Why was the world created containing, as it were, the death-resurrection motifs that appear everywhere in nature? Here is an answer worth pondering: The very act by which God created the world was an act referable to the death-resurrection theme. He created the world out of a nothingness similar to death and brought it into a dynamic being comparable to life.

The very act of resurrecting cosmos out of chaos is the fundamental pattern of death-resurrection that is repeated everywhere in the workings of the cosmos. The eternal Word in whom all things were created is the same eternal Word incarnate in Jesus who was raised from the dead, and the same eternal Word who will come again. Not only is this Word the Alpha and Omega, but also everything in between that makes reality intelligible.

Conclusion

To explain Jesus as "nothing but" another dying and rising god is an explanation that satisfies only those who lack a religious imagination and an appreciation for the magnificent complexity of reality. Overtaken by the regnant cultural paradigm of a naturalism that assumes only the raw world exists, the religious imagination of some writers is stifled to the point of exhaustion. The complex world goes unrecognized and everything is reduced to easy cliches. Mere ideology displaces wisdom. Only the most novel ideas are acceptable to the supposedly sophisticated. What is modish and daring finds many promoters because there is a large market for fads and novelties. Yet it is only through the lens of the apostolic faith and authentic Christian imagination, I believe, that the world is ultimately intelligible.

Leon McKenzie is the author of Pagan Resurrection Myths and the Resurrection of Jesus, 176pp, cloth, $24.95 (includes Priority Mail shipping).Send check or money order. The book is published by Bookwrights Press, 2255 Westover Drive, Suite 108, Charlottesville, VA 22901.

Mormon Culture and the Evil Beard

2010-03-10T15:29:00.005-07:00

As readers of this blog are aware, I am fascinated by the intersection of religion and culture. Of particular interest are those cultural aspects and influences on religion, whether recognized or not, but those in various religions and spiritualities.

I was reminded of this today while reading the Patheos electronic newsletter, with this issue focusing on Mormonism. One article caught my attention with the title "Beauty and the Beard: Facial Hair, Film, and Mormon Culture." As the title indicates, the article looks at the depiction of a character in a recent film for Mormons as evil through the inclusion of the symbolism and cultural coding of a beard. I had heard that facial hair is frowned upon in Mormonism, but never really took this seriously until this article. Brigham Young had a beard, as did many early Mormons, although you don't see many men today sporting them. Beyond this, as Eric Thompson, the author of the article notes, "LDS artwork from Arnold Freiberg and others (which, despite one's opinion for or against, is undeniably prevalent in LDS houses of worship), has given us bearded Nephis, Almas, Abinadis, Helamans, and Captain Moronis. (See here for background and examples.)"

But even with these precedents for beards in Mormonism, Thompson continues:

To what, therefore, could Holt be referring when he claims that giving Woodhouse a beard was an "unconscious" and "stereotypical" choice? The answer is almost certainly Mormon culture. Somewhere along the line, Mormonism began to identify facial hair as evil on an "unconscious" and "stereotypical" level, at least cinematically. Surely, every Mormon can reference a benevolent mustachioed role model from their own Mormon life, but can they do so from Mormon cinema?

I'm intrigued by this and would love to hear from Mormons on this. Do you agree with this portrayal of Mormon culture in regards to facial hair? If so, is it something conscious or unconscious? And what is the "cultural logic" for this?

As a bearded evangelical I'm curious.

Christian and Voodou Tensions Heightened in Haiti

2010-02-28T12:42:00.005-07:00

For Christians still reflecting on the earthquake tragedy that struck Haiti two recent and troubling aspects of a news story need to be carefully reflected upon in terms of our attitudes and actions toward those of other religions, particularly those that make Christians uncomfortable.

The Associated Press reports that a group of Evangelical Christians attacked a group of voodou practitioners.

"Voodooists gathered in Cite Soleil where thousands of quake survivors live in tents and depend on food aid. Praying and singing, the group was trying to conjure spirits to guide lost souls when a crowd of Evangelicals started shouting. Some threw rocks while others urinated on Voodoo symbols. When police left, the crowd destroyed the altars and Voodoo offerings of food and rum."

Some of this violence might be understood in relation to the escalating tensions that are running high, including religious ones, as a result of the devastation and deteriorating conditions in the country. But even so, this event is troubling to say the least, particularly in light of the second aspect of the story. This comes from comments made by a representative of a Christian ministry cited in the AP story:

"We would give food to the needy in the short term but if they refused to give up Voodoo, I'm not sure we would continue to support them in the long term because we wouldn't want to perpetuate that practice. We equate it with witchcraft, which is contrary to the Gospel."

The Christianity Today liveblog pursued the circumstances surrounding this quote and contacted the individual who made them. He is claiming that his comments were taken out of context and misrepresented. The reader can click here to read the blog post with the broader comments in order to assess the situation.

My hope is that these comments were not made, in any context. It seems difficult to think of any kind of more favorable context in which to find the comments more palatable. But regardless, this raises issues that Christians need to reflect upon, both in international situations where humanitarian need is met for those who are members of other religions, as well as in local neighborhoods where we rub shoulders with practitioners of other spiritual pathways.

First, we have got to figure out ways in which to seek a better understanding of the religions of others, especially with those religions that are often equated with "witchcraft." The association of voodou with the "witchcraft" of the Bible demonstrates a misunderstanding and misrepresentation of the beliefs of others, and when this is combined with the fears of "dark spiritual forces" found among Evangelicals, particularly in charismatic traditions, it is only natural that friction will result.

Second, Evangelicals need to move beyond viewing people in other religious traditions as objects for evangelism wherein the meeting of need is the means to the end of conversion. My thinking in this was stimulated most recently in reading a book that combined considerations from brain sciences with ideas related to religious conversion. Due to his perspective on human nature, as informed both by brain research and fresh biblical reflection, the author took exception to the common fundamentalist and Evangelical emphasis on "saving souls" and called for a more holistic approach that emphasized meeting human need as the Jesus story is lived out in different cultural contexts. Human beings, regardless of their religion or irreligion, are fellow image bearers of God and we come alongside of them to meet their needs as an outworking of our love for them and God regardless of whether they decide to embrace the pathway of Jesus.

I throw my thoughts into the mix for readers here, as well as for those who may weigh in at the Christianity Today liveblog site.

FRONTLINE: digital_nation: life on the virtual frontier

2010-02-03T18:18:00.005-07:00

Last night I caught a great episode of FRONTLINE with a focus on "digital_nation: life on the virtual frontier." From the program's website and its summary introduction:

Within a single generation, digital media and the World Wide Web have transformed virtually every aspect of modern culture, from the way we learn and work to the ways in which we socialize and even conduct war. But is the technology moving faster than we can adapt to it? And is our 24/7 wired world causing us to lose as much as we've gained?

In Digital Nation: Life on the Virtual Frontier, FRONTLINE presents an in-depth exploration of what it means to be human in a 21st-century digital world. Continuing a line of investigation she began with the 2008 FRONTLINE report Growing Up Online, award-winning producer Rachel Dretzin embarks on a journey to understand the implications of living in a world consumed by technology and the impact that this constant connectivity may have on future generations. "I'm amazed at the things my kids are able to do online, but I'm also a little bit panicked when I realize that no one seems to know where all this technology is taking us, or its long-term effects," says Dretzin.

The FRONTLINE website for this episode includes a wealth of information, and the episode can be watched there online as well.

New Journal: Evangelical Interfaith Dialogue

2010-01-31T12:51:00.003-07:00

I was pleased to learn of a new evangelical journal addressing the important topic of interreligious dialogue. It is called, appropriately enough, Evangelical Interfaith Dialogue. The first issue can be downloaded at this link. I'm still working my way through this first issue, but it appropriately begins within the evangelical fold in addressing the why of dialogue. The question on the lead article is "Mission and Dialogue? Is it possible to be an evangelical and engage in dialogue?". I would answer a hearty "yes" to these questions, that it is indeed possible to have evangelical commitments and yet also be supportive of a broad and robust form of dialogue that cannot be reduced to little more than a subtle form of evangelism. I wish this new journal well and hope that I can work with them in collaborative and cooperative ventures.

Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future

2010-01-22T19:54:00.008-07:00

An article in Religion Dispatches made me aware of a book that should be on the reading list for those interested in contemporary religious movements. The article involves responses by Bron Taylor to questions on his book Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future (University of California Press, 2009). The book's description:

"In this innovative and deeply felt work, Bron Taylor examines the evolution of "green religions" in North America and beyond: spiritual practices that hold nature as sacred and have in many cases replaced traditional religions. Tracing a wide range of groups--radical environmental activists, lifestyle-focused bioregionalists, surfers, new-agers involved in "ecopsychology," and groups that hold scientific narratives as sacred--Taylor addresses a central theoretical question: How can environmentally oriented, spiritually motivated individuals and movements be understood as religious when many of them reject religious and supernatural worldviews? The "dark" of the title further expands this idea by emphasizing the depth of believers' passion and also suggesting a potential shadow side: besides uplifting and inspiring, such religion might mislead, deceive, or in some cases precipitate violence. This book provides a fascinating global tour of the green religious phenomenon, enabling readers to evaluate its worldwide emergence and to assess its role in a critically important religious revolution."

In answering the question in the interview as to what sparked his interest in the topic for this book Taylor writes:

"I have long been interested in grassroots social and environmental movements, and whether and to what extent religious perceptions and moral values motivates their participants. When working on an earlier book, Ecological Resistance Movements, I began to see that ideas that found fertile ground within grassroots environmental movements around the world were becoming increasingly influential. As I traveled around the world in the subsequent years, I encountered a fascinating and diverse set of examples that convinced me that something new and critically important was emerging that could decisively reshape the political, environmental, and religious landscape. I called this phenomena Dark Green Religion, and by this I mean religious (or religion-resembling) beliefs and practices that consider nature to be sacred and worthy of reverent care, and non-human organisms to be kin and as having intrinsic value."

When Taylor is asked what he wants his readers to take away from the book, in part he says:

"Religion and environmental ethics were transformed forever when on November 24, 1859, Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species was published. It shattered traditional religious explanations for the fecundity and diversity of the biosphere. Where this cognitive shift has been made, traditional religions with their beliefs in non-material divine beings are in decline. The desire for a spiritually meaningful understanding of the cosmos, however, did not wither away, and new forms of spirituality have been filling the cultural niches previously occupied by conventional religions. I argue that the forms I document in Dark Green Religion are much more likely to survive than longstanding religions, which involved beliefs in invisible, non-material beings. This is because most contemporary nature spiritualities are sensory (based on what we perceive with our senses, sometimes enhanced by clever gadgets), and thus sensible. They also tend to promote ecologically adaptive behaviors, which enhances the survival prospects of their carriers, and thus their own long-term survival prospects."

A few observations are in order for contemporary students of religion.

First, as Taylor reminds us, religion is not always defined by belief in a divine being.

Second, this Dark Green Religion dovetails with Gordon Lynch's discussion about progressive spirituality in his book The New Spirituality: An Introduction to Progressive Belief in the Twenty-first Century (I.B. Tauris, 2007).

Third, the discussion of this religious nature spirituality lends credibility to conservatives who have argued there is often a religious dimension to many facets of the environmental movement.

Fourth, in terms of popular culture, such sentiments may also be seen underlying the science fiction/fantasy film Avatar, which has resonated with audiences for this and other reasons.

Dark Green Religion will help readers understand such sentiments, and gain a greater sense of a movement that will likely continue to exert broad influence. Chapter one can be read here as a preview.

Interview at Sacred Tribes Journal: Miguel De La Torre on Haiti, It's People and Religion

2010-01-17T13:19:00.003-07:00

A new interview is now available at Sacred Tribes Journal with Miguel De La Torre, Associate Professor of Social Ethics at Iliff School of Theology. Dr. De La Torre has researched, written, and lectured on a number of topics, including the Afro-Cuban religion of Santeria, as well as social ethics and biblical interpretation from the perspective of marginalized peoples. I interview him at Sacred Tribes Journal on the topic of Haiti, it's people and its religious expressions. Here is an excerpt:

John Morehead: Although America has invested a lot of money in Haiti over the years and through various presidential administrations, they know very little about the nation. Many assume it is largely a nation which practices voodoo when in fact it has a large Christian population. Can you paint a portrait of Haitian religious expression?

Miguel De La Torre: Before I address the religious aspects I’d like to discuss America’s investment in Haiti. We need to be aware that America from very early on never really wanted to see Haiti succeed. When the Haitian slaves overthrew their slave owner masters, this was really the first democracy in the Caribbean that was established. The democracy in the United States was leery of having a Haitian democracy. People like Thomas Jefferson were very concerned that a nation of free black people, run by free black people might be a bad inspiration for his personal black slaves and those in the South. There has always been this desire to make sure the Haitian people did not succeed because if they were to succeed as a country then that would begin to undermine the mythology of white supremacy. This was active in the time of Jefferson, up to the Civil War, and after the Civil War. So there has always been this relationship with Haiti where we did not want to see it be successful. Saying that, the other thing we need to keep in mind is that the United States has throughout the last century had Haiti as part of its gunboat diplomacy as well as a good neighbor policy. Both tend to appropriate the resources of Haiti for the economic benefit of the United States. I want to emphasize this relationship between the two countries for the last couple of centuries that has not always been positive for the Haitian people.

As to the religiosity of Haiti, it’s naïve to say that all Haitians are practitioners of voodoo. It would be the same as saying all Americans are Protestants. It’s a very simplistic, naïve understanding. There is a strong presence of the Catholic Church, of Protestants and evangelicals including missionaries, of Pentecostals, also of African traditions, and a hybridity of all these traditions. Those in most Caribbean nations do not necessarily conform to just one religion. It is common to be a member of more than one tradition. So when I was growing up in New York City I went to Catholic school and at night we practiced Santeria, and there didn’t seem to be a disconnect in my mind or that of the other practitioners.

Read the entire interview here.