From the Stacks: May 18, 2007
By Staff, Utne.com

Utne Reader's library is abuzz with a steady flow of 1,500 magazines, newsletters, journals, weeklies, zines, and other lively dispatches from the cultural front that are rarely found at big-box bookstores, newsstands, or even online. So we share the highlights (and occasional lowlights) of what's landing in our library each week in 'From the Stacks.' Check in every Friday for the latest edition.

As religious conflicts wrack the globe, Interreligious Insight is fostering cooperation among the world's faiths. The April issue covers how to promote peace, the challenges of reporting on religion, and offers a traditional prayer from the Native American Ute tribe called 'Earth Teacher.' In an article about women's interfaith groups, Kathryn Lohre praises storytelling methods, personal testimony, and building everyday relationships as tools to further religious understanding. Additionally, an occasional 'Open Book' department takes a recent publication (this issue picks up Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion) and uses it as a starting point to critically examine interfaith themes with a depth that shorter reviews can't reach. -- Julie Dolan

First published as the Literary Review in 1885, Britain's New Humanist is a bastion of thought on humanism, rational inquiry, and secularism. It's also one of the oldest magazines in print. The May/June issue features articles on global threats to women's rights, the modernist architecture of Alvar Aalto, and a warning that American neoconservatives have big plans for the future, despite the failures of George W. Bush. Jake Bromberg's cover story, 'Hold Relics,' calls for the eviction of the Lords Spiritual, a group of Anglican bishops and archbishops guaranteed 26 seats in the House of Lords. Bromberg argues that with an increasingly multicultural society and falling congregation numbers, Lords Spiritual is a vestige of bygone times that ill-serves the United Kingdom. -- Eric Kelsey