Lately, it seems like every publication in Utne Reader’s library that isn’t busy analyzing who’s to blame for this economic crunch is offering up tips and tricks for living on less—and with good cause. No time like the present for expending some mental energy on how we all might live more thriftily and lightly on the earth.

Which is what makes far too many of the thrifty-livin’ articles so, well, disappointing. I swear I’m going to jam a recycling bin over my head if I read one more cheerful checklist urging me to grow my own food. Um, yes. Gardens are great. More gardens = even greater. But is that the best (see: only) idea we have?

I’m not losing hope. The latest issue of BackHome—their 100^th, as a matter of fact—just arrived, and brought with it “50 Ways to Live on Less,” a great article chock full of not-everybody-else’s ideas. The piece isn’t available online, so here’s a handful of suggestions that got my feathers fluffed:

#6 Think of your three favorite ways to cook beans and do those every week. Aside from the roadkill mentioned above, it’s hard to find a cheaper source of protein (and beans are more appetizing, too). Try beans in soups, salads, burgers, or in anything but ice cream.

#11 Use clear containers for food storage, so you can identify and eat food before it goes bad.

#41 Don’t be afraid to barter with anyone for goods or services. This includes doctors and lawyers.

#50 Write down your life goals, then write down your monthly expenses. Figure which expenses aren’t meeting your life goals, and cut out those expenses.

While we’re on the subject of not-boring advice, I’d be remiss if I didn’t also mention our sister publication Mother Earth News, a font of information when it comes to efficient, smart, do-it-yourself living. Plus, you can ask its knowledgeable editors questions, too. Really. And if anyone out there has seen unconventional stories or has unusual ideas for scaling back and living smart—I’d love to see some links.

UPDATE (5/6/2009): Oh ho! As it turns out, Craig Idlebrook, the author of BackHome’s “50 Ways to Live on Less,” wrote an even more expansive article in 2007 for Utne’s sister publication Mother Earth News. “Live on Less and Love It!” offers up 75 inspiring, unconventional ideas for a happy, thrifty life—and you can read them all online. Thanks to Mother Earth News managing editor John Rockhold for the tip.

Sources: BackHome, Mother Earth News

The intersection of spirituality and environmentalism is somewhere in Idaho—on a gravel road where a painted turtle is trudging across, making her way from one marsh to another. “My spirits soared,” Rick Bass writes in Shambhala Sun, “at the life-affirming tenacity of her journey, her crossing, as well at this most physical manifestation that indeed the back of winter was broken; for here, exhumed once again by the warm breath of the awakening earth, was the most primitive vertebrate still among us.”

Here’s to that awakening earth, and all the surging, ecstatic feelings it can conjure. For as much time as we might spend talking (and listening, reading, and thinking) about the need to protect the earth, to save our fragile, damaged world: We need to connect with it too. For Bass, it’s all in one: “For me, activism is a form of prayer, a way of paying back some small fraction of the blessing that the wilderness is to me.”

Source: Shambhala Sun

Image by Pvt. Pondscum, licensed under Creative Commons.

Modern furniture is having an identity crisis. A couch can no longer be content as a simple couch, now it must be able to convert into a bed, or a desk, or a stove (yes, a stove).  The houseware-gadgetry isn’t always as functional as it may seem, and much of it never gets past the prototype stage, but Greg Beato writes for the Smart Set that the dual functions imbue our lives with a “luster of utility.”

The motivation behind the overly complicated stuff goes beyond saving money and saving space. Beato writes:

We are on a spiritual quest to attain higher and higher levels of seamless efficiency and fruitless productivity, and our iPhones can’t shoulder the burden of our dreams entirely by themselves, can they?  We need furniture that is as promiscuously versatile as Swiss Army knives — chairs that are 300 percent more chair-like than normal chairs, coffee tables that blossom into dining tables, stoves you can sit on without setting your ass on fire.

Source: The Smart Set 

Very few of us today ever experience true darkness. Artificial lighting smudges out the stars, confuses creatures of the night, wastes energy, and has damaging effects on human health. In “Let There Be Night: Testimony on Behalf of the Dark,” (University of Nevada Press, 2008) , editor Paul Bogard compiled thoughtful and evocative essays from 29 writers, poets, scientists, and scholars. Bogard encourages readers to take “this collection to their own favorite nighttime roost, somewhere with amber light to shade the darkness, somewhere with stars close by, somewhere with the scents and sounds of darkness.”

If we heed Bogard's advice, there's a lot we might glean from darkness. In one essay, environmental activist and writer Janisse Ray draws from personal experience to expound on spirituality: “What has confused us is the double entendre. Our desire for meaning keeps us reaching for greater clarity and luminosity. But we confound lucidity with kilowatts. We confuse artificial light with enlightenment. Therein lies a greater fear: that we humans might be so afraid of darkness that we, for a time, would destroy it, thus banishing the illumination that darkness brings.”

Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins, authors of the end-times fiction Left Behind have confirmed: Barack Obama is not the Antichrist. The question came up recently after the John McCain campaign released an ad not-so-subtly implying that his political opponent may be the harbinger of the apocalypse. "I've gotten a lot of questions the last few weeks asking if Obama is the antichrist," Jenkins told the Christian NewsWire. "I tell everyone that I don't think the antichrist will come out of politics, especially American politics." LeHaye added, “I can see by the language he uses why people think he could be the antichrist, but from my reading of scripture, he doesn't meet the criteria.” 

Here’s what I struggle with figuring out: Will the apocalypse enthusiasts be relieved that the final battle between good and evil isn’t here yet, or will they be disappointed?

(Thanks, Adult Christianity.)

At its core, psychoanalysis is a quest for self knowledge, in some ways similar to religious study. Patrick Lee Miller writes for the Immanent Frame that psychoanalysis is a “source of self,” borrowing a phrase from author Charles Taylor, and is able to “enrich our lives with meaning, arrange our activities to serve higher goals, and thus motivate us at times to act beyond our narrow interests.” And if psychoanalysis is able to generate wisdom and reveal meaning, why can’t it be considered alongside other modern worldviews and religions?

As much as people try to avoid it, religion and politics have taken center stage in the 2008 Olympic games. The Israeli coach of the Russian basketball team made headlines recently by shaking hands with the captain of the Iranian team, the Jerusalem Post reports, in a show of interfaith support. The gesture occurred the day after an Iranian swimmer refused to race against an Israeli. President Bush then added his own dose of religious politics to the games in a speech saying, “No state, man, or woman should fear the influence of a loving religion.”

For many competitors in the Olympics, athletics and religion are inexorably linked. Josh McAdams, a Mormon American steeplechase competitor, told the Washington Post, “athletics is not only physical and mental but spiritual.” Unfortunately for McAdams, practicing that spirituality is difficult inside the Olympic Village, as China has banned many foreign chaplains from living with the athletes. China promised to provide their own religious leaders, but the Washington Post reports that religious facilities on the Olympic grounds are remote, often don’t have enough space for worshipers, and participants are getting frustrated by the inadequate language skills of the service leaders.

Private worship aside, athletes are also under threat from the Chinese government and the International Olympic Committee, should they express their religion openly during the games. In another article for the Washington Post, Wang Baodong, a Chinese Government spokesperson said, “There are very specific provisions on how an athlete should practice his religion or beliefs during the games.”

Many have pointed out that hampering religious practice violates the Olympic commitment to freedom of expression. It also goes against the explicit religious traditions of the Olympic Games, Louis A. Ruprecht writes for Religion Dispatches. Ruprecht points out that the founder of the modern Olympic Games, Pierre de Coubertin, once referred to the event as religio athletae, explicitly positioning the competition as religious. Even today, when the event is being held in an expressly non-religious country, Ruprecht writes that “the Modern Olympics are choreographed to give the athletes, and to a lesser degree, the spectators, a spiritual experience of enormous and lasting power.”

Strongly held beliefs regarding religion, politics, and sexuality can complicate relationships with loved ones. Those relationships are even more difficult when they involve blood relations, and their beliefs differ markedly from ours.

In a poignant essay for the group website BlogHer, Zoe Gaymo describes her difficult relationship with her father. He is a practicing Catholic, and she is a lesbian. While they get along most of the time, issues have a way of flaring up. “Over the years , I have learned that when my dad gets to talking about religion or politics, I should just let him say what he has to say and not argue with him. ... But every once in a while, he pushes my buttons (the gay ones) and I just can't not say something, which usually ends in me pushing his buttons (the Catholic Church ones).”

The essay illustrates how, even with the best of intentions, parents and their adult offspring can spend their whole lives in a cycle of upsetting disagreement and tenuous reconciliation, never able to find common ground. Gaymo ends her essay resigned, saying: “I know my parents will never change. I just wish they would.”

Image adapted from a photo by Chris Darling, licensed by Creative Commons.

As much as there is dividing Jews and Muslims, the two religions have more in common than their belief in Abraham. Writing for Tikkun, (article not available online) Zalman Schachter-Shalomi calls attention to the large body of Judeo-Arabic writings that could point the way toward greater conciliation between the two groups.

Largely unknown to both Jews and Muslims, Judeo-Arabic literature was written in an Arabic dialect with Hebrew script by Jews living in Islamic countries. The famous Jewish philosopher Maimonides, in fact, wrote in both standard Arabic and in Judeo-Arabic. The authors of the texts were undoubtedly influenced by Muslim scholars, Schachter-Shalomi writes, and influenced the Muslim scholars in turn. Schachter-Shalomi envisions a website where Muslims and Jews could read and study the texts, translating the writing for the Muslim world at large and creating a greater understanding between the two religions.

The Kashmir region between India and Pakistan is known more for religious and political strife than it is for symbols of peace, and there’s good reason for that. The Christian Science Monitor reports that the area is being threatened once again by bombings, allegedly by Islamic terrorists, that could inflame historical tensions between Pakistan and India.

Deep in that violence-plagued region , the Amarnath Cave represents both the problems and the hope for the Kashmir region, according Peter Manseau, writing for the newly founded Search magazine. Hundreds of thousands of Hindus make the arduous pilgrimage to the Amarnath Cave in southern Kashmir every year to visit an icy shrine to the Hindu deity Shiva. Legends say that the shrine was discovered by a Muslim shepherd, who showed the cave to a Hindu priest, who immediately recognized it as a holy place.

Today, the symbol of interfaith cooperation is being threatened, not only by the violence that seems endemic to the entire region, but also by climate change. With average temperatures on the rise, and throngs of people packing into the cave, Manseau reports that the ice shrine has begun to melt earlier each year. Many pilgrims haven’t been able to see the object of their journey at all, and instead have been shown crudely packed snow in its place.

For Manseau, the Amarnath Cave represents both the good and bad in the Kashmir region: The interfaith cooperation and the religious strife, the importance of symbols to human faith and the lengths people will go to protect them. “Holy ground reminds us of all we hope for,” Manseau writes, “and all that might be lost.”

Sorcerers who find themselves a little short on scratch should cast a spell or two to make some extra money, Thuri Calafia writes for Pan Gaia, an Oregon-based pagan publication (article not available online). When Calafia broke up with her boyfriend and needed money for a new place to live, she created a magical herbal concoction and was able to find the money she needed. Of course, the spells didn’t make cash materialize from thin air. Instead, most of that money came when her boss announced more available overtime, but Calafia believes that was a direct result of her magic. 

Some pagans don’t like using spells to make money, but Calafia writes that money magic can be entirely ethical. After all, pagans make house payments, too.

 

When a politician sneezes and the religious right says, “God bless you,” Sarah Posner is there to document it on her American Prospect web-exclusive column, the FundamentaList. For almost a year now, Posner has been chronicling the religious right’s activities in this weekly roundup. Last week’s offering calls attention to a proposed new rule by the Department of Health and Human Services that opens the door for federally funded health-care providers to hire people who object to oral contraceptives and emergency contraceptives. Posner encourages Barack Obama to publicly acknowledge that this new ruling comes from the “right-wing ideologues,” knowing that John McCain’s “medieval record on women’s health issues” won’t help the problem.

The Bible has many parts that ring sexist to modern ears. People are constantly trying to make prayers less sexist by saying, “Mother-Father,” when referring to God, instead of just “Father,” or substituting “reign” for the more gendered “kingdom.” Inevitably, there are those who buck against such efforts. Writing for Theoblog, the blog of the Christian Century magazine, Jason Byassee writes that it’s a mistake “to think Christian language can ever be scrubbed into safety.” Instead of changing the words of the prayer, Byassee writes that the faithful should change the way they live, because, “[w]ords themselves don’t abuse… people abuse with words.”

Taking a page from the evangelical mega-churches that have popped up around the country, Muslims have begun setting up multi-site “mosque chains” to accommodate increasingly large religious services, Mallika Rao reports for the Religion News Service. Often branded as more progressive than other mosques, some of the organizations have begun offering gymnasiums, adult education classes, and even mixed-gender prayer areas. The strategy seems to be paying off, both financially and organizationally. Abeer Abdulla, a media specialist for the Islamic Society of Central Florida in Orlando, told Rao, "because of how streamlined we are, you can get off the highway from anywhere and find a mosque that is well-maintained, well-structured and that will always be open." 

(Thanks, Pew Forum.)

Reaching out to young, single adults is quickly becoming a necessity for religious leaders. In the July/August issue of the Futurist, Aaron M. Cohen addresses the lack of programs in organized religion for singles between 20 and 45 years old. With most spiritual activities geared toward elderly folks and married couples with children, it’s no wonder that singletons aren’t finding the welcoming support they need. Adding programs that interest young and single people could help quell the national participation decline in organized religion.

One evangelical church in Concord, North Carolina, has already adapted services for today’s individualistic, tech-savvy generation. The Concord First Assembly has a community for young single adults called the “Underground,” which “offers espresso, pool tables, satellite TV, and free wi-fi” to participants. Rather than set an alarm for Sunday morning worship, members can attend the 7 p.m. “Underground” service. The group also has a profile on MySpace and Facebook, an approach that may help congregations connect with younger members.

Cohen says that, “while the internet will likely become the medium that people turn to most often when seeking religious information, it is unlikely that the virtual church, synagogue, or mosque will replace its real-world counterpart anytime soon.” It seems that the physicality of worship is one tradition that won’t lose to the era of increasingly impersonal communication.

Image by  iron fillings , licensed under  Creative Commons . 

Hollywood has been bombarding moviegoers with apocalyptic visions, from 2007’s No Country for Old Men to The Happening to the current Disney/Pixar darling, Wall-E. Faced with their bleak depictions of the future (Wall-E lightens it up for the kids, of course), religion is sometimes offered as a countervailing, hopeful force against such dark visions.

Examining No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood, and Cormac McCarthy’s novel The Road as emblematic of our bleak cultural outlook, the wellness magazine Lilipoh (article not available online) finds hope through pastor and author Brian McLaren’s vision of "emergent Christianity" to fight the “sense of impending doom [that] fills all three works.” Rather than despairing over the ineffably evil of characters like No Country’s mass-murdering Anton Chigurh, Lilipoh suggests turning to Jesus’ original message of helping others to find hope:

Radical forgiveness, service to the poor and sick, a slow and steady aligning of our will with God’s...stripped of the nauseating rhetoric and distorted lens that the Christian church has all too often applied—this message offers a revolutionary and unlikely promise. 

Film critics offer a different way to lessen the depressing effects of hopeless movies: deny their credibility. David Denby's therapeutically harsh appraisal of No Country for Old Men from the New Yorker, for example, credits the film for its skillful opening twenty minutes of “the physical and psychological realization of dread,” but the final judgment is dismissive. “In the end," Denby writes, "the movie’s despair is unearned.” 

Image by Anthony Easton, licensed under Creative Commons. 

If you’ve ever found yourself struggling to be open-minded about someone's spiritual beliefs, Emily DePrang can empathize. In “Cult Following,” a Nerve essay subtitled, “How I learned to embrace my girlfriend’s ridiculous religion,” DePrang describes the bumpy spiritual path that lead to her girlfriend Sam, a follower of Mata Amritanandamayi Devi, known in the West as Amma, the “hugging saint.” The use of the word "ridiculous" in the piece's subtitle is appropriate, since spiritually transcendent moments aren't always elegant or otherworldly, and might seem absurd at first blush.

Finding spirituality in the seemingly ridiculous is also the focus of a piece by Rabbi Naomi Levy in Moment Magazine. Levy describes an epiphany she had involving a spectral figure wrapped in what appeared to be toilet paper. She sheepishly told her boyfriend about her vision, afraid of appearing insane, but he pointed out that “if God can could come to Moses in a burning bush, who's to say that God can't come to you in a roll of Charmin?” 

Both stories explore the confluence of the absurd and sublime, a point well-taken by a cynic like me. The experience for me isn't always spiritual, but the act of finding beauty and common ground with others is almost always revelatory. For Emily and Sam, the story culminates in a pilgrimage to a desert ashram where they receive hugs from Amma herself, and Emily’s cynicism dissolves. DePrang's writing is well-suited for the subject: sharp and sardonic but also kind. She’s an assured writer who can still articulate her doubts. The piece—just as much a love story as it is a story about religion—considers the ways compassion can chip away at skepticism, both in our spirituality and our relationships with others.

Image by  kalandrakas , licensed by  Creative Commons .

As gas prices continue to skyrocket, members of the Pray at the Pump movement are looking towards the heavens for salvation. The British newspaper Telegraph reports that members of the First Church of Seventh-day Adventists are organizing prayer vigils at gas stations around the US, asking for divine salvation from the high oil prices. The movement’s founder, Rocky Twyman, claims that after one particularly large vigil in Ohio, the price of oil dropped in Toledo by 30 cents. The article did not, however, report on any plans for services surrounding John McCain’s proposed “gas tax holiday.”

Image adapted from photos by Infrogmation and Gabriel Ullmann, licensed under Creative Commons.

When the 73-year-old Dalai Lama dies, his successor as Buddhism’s leading voice is likely to be the Karmapa Lama, a 23-year-old with a fondness for X-Men comic books. PBS Religion & Ethics Newsweekly profiled the Karmapa Lama, who holds the unique position of being “the only high lama to have been officially recognized by both the Dalai Lama and the Chinese government.” At the age of 14, he escaped from the Chinese Government, over the Himalayas, to join the Dalai Lama in India, and the two have studied and meditated together since.

In the profile, the Karmapa Lama shows an understanding of the huge responsibility being placed upon him, and an awareness of the effect that technology is having on the Buddhist faith. He said:

Because of the Internet, we live in an age in which information can travel very rapidly to different places. Before, it used to be the case that just having a karmapa alive was good enough for everyone. People didn't need a lot of information about who the karmapa was or what the karmapa was doing.

Judging by the official blog from his recent U.S. visit, this Karmapa Lama is taking every opportunity to use the new technology to make his voice heard.

Image by PrinceRoy, licensed under Creative Commons.

The website Garfield Minus Garfield made a splash in the blogosphere by taking the famous cartoon cat out of his eponymous comic strip. According to the blog’s creator, when owner Jon Arbuckle is bereft of his beloved pet, the strip is about, “schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and the empty desperation of modern life.” Rabbi Micah Kelber writes for Jewcy that the comic strip could also be about “seeking a relationship with God.” 

The boredom, frustrations, and simple pleasures in Arbuckle’s life reveal the highs and lows of a religious life. The problem is that by reading the strip this way, Kelber manages to kill most of the humor from the joke.

Image courtesy of Garfield Minus Garfield.

To some people, the word “Christians” brings to mind conservative, anti-everything culture warriors. Others think of peace-and-justice activism or the Civil Rights movement. In fact, the U.S. church has long been divided along theological, cultural, and political lines—and the different groups have tended to keep their distance. 

A two-year-old group called Christian Churches Together in the USA (CCT) is working to bridge this divide. CCT—an ecumenical group, or one focused on Christian unity across traditions—has brought together an unusually broad group of church denominations to build relationships and to speak with one voice on consensus subjects.

The Reverend Wesley Granberg-Michaelson, general secretary of the Reformed Church in America, convened the group and serves as one of its five presidents. Utne.com spoke with Granberg-Michaelson about CCT’s plans to meet with the president-elect about poverty, as well as about his earlier work as the main Vietnam-era legislative assistant to Sen. Mark Hatfield and as a writer on ecotheology.

CCT has released a pretty concrete policy statement on poverty. Among other things, it calls for a specific target and timeline for reducing child poverty—just the kind of thing that serious anti-poverty advocates are promoting. What did it take for such a broad group to produce this statement?

Conversation. Building trust. But the proposal that we turn to the issue of poverty actually came from the evangelical/Pentecostal family of the church. The old stereotype was that evangelicals care [only] about personal conversion and doctrinal integrity. Now, Christians have come together and asked, “What can we all agree on?” Poverty is one thing.

What are the statement’s implications? Are the denominations expected to promote its goals in their policy shops or to organize their members around it?

Well, CCT doesn’t operate such that this is the central thing that everyone [has to] embrace. But we’re sharing our resources, approaches, and understanding. And we plan to pursue a meeting with the country’s eventual president-elect, to present the statement and talk about how its goals could be achieved. Such a meeting is likely to happen, given the breadth of leadership at CCT.

Because the White House can’t write it off as simply a partisan thing coming from one side or the other.

That’s been exactly the problem before. Christians have divided ideologically and politically, reducing their overall effectiveness.

Can we expect to see similar statements in the future? Maybe on global warming or human rights?

It’s likely we’ll keep considering what we can reach consensus on, but we don’t have a list.

How is interfaith work like and unlike ecumenical work?

Both are extremely important. But they’re different, and sometimes there’s a tendency to blur that distinction. Ecumenical work is about Christian unity. In interfaith relations, Christians sometimes try to find the easiest common denominator—joining hands with those of other faiths to address issues in the world. And this is important.

But in my experience, what dialogue partners from other faiths really desire and expect is an earnest witness of each to the other. Muslims want to hear how Christian faith is understood and articulated, and I want to hear the same about theirfaith. That’s what makes interfaith discussion really rich.

Has U.S. foreign policy posed any challenges for international ecumenical work?

There used to be 1.3 million Christians in Iraq. Now, about half have been forced out and are living in Jordan, Egypt, Syria, and so forth. But U.S. policy has made things really difficult for Christians in those countries. It’s had the consequence of equating Christianity, in the minds of many, with a very aggressive stance in the region.

As legislative assistant to Republican Senator Mark Hatfield from 1968 to 1976, you worked on the Hatfield-McGovern amendment to end the war in Vietnam. Any insights for our current situation?

The Hatfield-McGovern legislation was genuinely bipartisan. Hatfield was a Republican, joined by others. And those who most strongly resisted the proposal included prominent Democrats, such as John Stennis, chair of the Armed Services committee. So the debate at that time within Congress was healthier—it wasn’t locked into the severe partisanship that we see today. The same with the country at large.

You mean, specifically, party lines—not political polarization broadly, which was as severe as ever in 1970.

Absolutely. It wasn’t polarized around parties, so it was possible to have a debate about the real merits. Hatfield argued around constitutional issues of war-making powers, the interests of the United States, the nature of the conflict in Vietnam itself. These arguments could be made in ways in which one’s party affiliation didn’t just close off the discussion.

That’s not to say that party didn’t matter. Nixon tried to use all kinds of influence on Republicans, as Johnson did before him with Democrats. But party loyalty did not immediately determine one’s stance on the war. This is different from what it’s mostly been like today.

Of course, Hatfield-McGovern didn’t pass. In today’s more partisan climate, is there any hope of meaningful congressional action?

It didn’t pass, though a modified version did get 49 votes in the Senate. Congressional action against the war is far more unlikely now. Nothing will happen before the presidential election, in any event.

In the 1980s, you did some work on ecotheology. Arguing that a theology of “stewardship” of the earth is inadequate—because it conceives of people as separate from and above nature—you called instead for a theology of “interrelationship.” Recently, many evangelicals have signed on to a pro-environment agenda framed in terms of stewardship. Do you feel any tension between the ideas you developed then and the ecumenical work you do now?

No. Back then, I felt that the language of “stewardship” could too easily be misused. Secretary of the Interior James Watt and others would throw the word around as a justification to use creation, to do with it what we want.

We still see that. Religious right leader James Dobson talks positively about stewardship, but he doesn’t mean it.

It’s a word that you can pour a variety of meanings into, so I thought other terms and approaches might be more helpful. Today, I mainly marvel at the way this has come onto the church’s agenda. It was barely on the radar, and now a majority of Christians acknowledge a responsibility to relate to creation as a gift.

When I went to work for the World Council of Churches in 1988, we started working on global warming. Many of my colleagues initially said, “What does this have to do with the burning questions of economic justice?” Since then, the church’s work has helped reveal the interconnection between those questions. Now, when you look at the coverage of global warming, people are making the connections to the effect on the poor and vulnerable. This wasn’t understood even 15 years ago.

Still, there is a fundamental difference between stewardship and interconnectedness. Maybe what it comes down to is that now that we’re seeing this idea of stewardship actually lived out by evangelicals, the end result isn’t a difference that matters much.

From where I sit now, that’s about what I’d say. Those questions still matter; they go back to fundamental things: How do you understand humanity’s role in creation? But what finally makes a difference is that 17- and 18-year-olds in evangelical, Catholic, and Orthodox churches are more likely to take for granted that global warming is something that Christians need to be concerned about.

Do you worry that the current focus on global warming might lead us to neglect other environmental issues?

It could. But with the global food crisis in the headlines, it’s interesting to note the connections to energy and other issues. The more you get into any environmental question, the more you see its interconnectedness with other questions. Because it’s simply the way it is.

Image courtesy of Reformed Church in America.

A battle has erupted over religious freedom in South Carolina. Earlier this year, the state’s general assembly voted unanimously to begin producing license plates bearing the phrase “I Believe” and decorated with an image of a yellow cross superimposed over a stained-glass window. Lieutenant Governor Andre Bauer even offered to pay for the plates’ production out of his own pocket.

Last month, Americans United for Separation of Church and State filed a lawsuit alleging that the plate constituted a governmental endorsement of one religion over all others, and a clear violation of the First Amendment.

While many church-and-state cases draw a distinction between secular and religious people, this case is particularly compelling because much of the license-plate criticism has come from inside the religious community. Plaintiffs against the plates include a rabbi, the American Hindu Foundation, and three ministers, among them the Rev. Dr. Neal Jones, who penned a guest editorial in the State arguing that while “America is a nation of Christians, we are not a Christian nation.” Despite the barrage of hostile email received by Americans United—accusing the organization’s members of being nonbeilevers and condemning them to hell (among other nasty epithets)—religious people, in this case, are some of the loudest voices championing the separation between church and state.

Teeming with Buddhist reflections on the modern world, the Mindfulness Bell, encourages readers to “dwell deeply in the present moment, to be aware of what is going on within and around us.”

Buddhist incantations are rife throughout the magazine: “Breathing in, I see the goodness inside of you. Breathing out, I smile at your goodness." But plenty of the articles will be relevant to anyone who thinks, or would like to think, spiritually about current events and world affairs.

The Summer issue includes a feature section on the aftermath of war, with personal narratives that address issues ranging from the responsibility for the war in Iraq to recounting the effects of post-traumatic stress and drug addiction. In an essay inspired by his first visit to Vietnam years after the war, Brian McNaught describes his difficult choice to become conscientious objector, and why young people today aren’t faced with the same involvement in the war in Iraq.

For readers already geared up for Buddhism in practice, each issue features the teachings of Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh. The Summer issue also has a great section on spirituality for children, including a dharma talk directed to youth and activities to involve little ones in the pursuit of mindfulness.

Sustaining your newly achieved multi-level awareness may be difficult, however, since the Mindfulness Bell is published only three times a year. Breathing in, I see the motivation in you. Breathing out, I smile at your motivation.

Cosmic forces are combining in strange and astrologically stressful ways leading up to the 2008 election, Barry Orr writes for Reality Sandwich. On election day, November 4, 2008, Saturn and Uranus will be in direct opposition with each other. Saturn is a force for conservatism, according to Orr, while Uranus is a force for reform. Having these two planets 180 degrees apart from the earth, as they will be on election day, could be cataclysmic. Orr suggests a number of astrologically possible situations:

1. “The election will be postponed or canceled due to some ‘national emergency.’”
2. “One or more candidates will leave the race.”
3. “There will be rampant fraud or data foul-ups on Election Day, and yet another election will be stolen.”

The fates laid out by Orr and other astrologers aren’t deterministic. There were, however, a number of prescient political readings made by astrologers before. Orr gives the example of astrologer Jim Shawvan, who predicted before the 2000 election: 

The election may be so close in some states that it may be several days before the actual electoral college votes can be tallied with accuracy. This could involve the counting of absentee ballots, and possible charges of fraud or irregularities in some places. As of election night, it may look very much like a Bush victory, but uncertainty may develop as the count goes on.

Although he’s still on John McCain’s short list, revelations that Bobby Jindal took part in an unconventional exorcism ceremony must have hurt the Louisiana governor’s chances at the vice presidential nod. Jindal wrote about his exorcism experience in 1994 for the New Oxford Review, a Roman Catholic magazine. In the article, deconstructed on the Daily Kingfish blog, Jindal describes a formative religious experience where a number of students laid hands on a young woman who tried to escape, but was restrained by the students who forced her to read passages from the bible. “The essay raises more questions than answers,” according to the Daily Kingfish, “and many of these questions are uncomfortable.”

Part of the discomfort stems from the fact that exorcisms in America are often confined to the movies. In Germany, however, exorcisms are experiencing a revival in popularity, according to an article from the British Times Online. The German Catholic Church has shied away from exorcisms since 1973, when a 23-year-old woman was killed during an exorcism ceremony. Today, the Times reports that hundreds Germans are turning to find exorcists abroad, where cultures are more accepting of the pracitce. In Italy, for example, the Times estimates that there are some 300 trained exorcists.

“To the people who come to see me, I first advise them to go see a doctor or a psychologist,” the official exorcist of the Diocese of Rome, Father Gabriele Amorth, told the Spanish newspaper La Razon, but there are still enough possessed people to keep him busy. At 82 years old, Amorth has performed an estimated 70,000 exorcisms in his lifetime, he continues to work seven days each week, and his schedule is full for the next two months. Amorth also gave some insight into the roll of exorcisms in politics, telling La Razon, “the devil likes to take over those that hold political positions.”

Spanish photographer Fèlix Curto's latest exhibit, “Heart of Gold: Visits to the Mennonite communities in America,” on display at La Fábrica Galería in Madrid, is the result of a number of visits to traditional  Mennonite communities. The website We Make Money Not Art showcases the photographer's work, some of which could reinforce the popular perception of Mennonites as luddites who live apart from modern society. Comments on the site point out that the people represented are a small subset of a larger Mennonite population that has otherwise integrated itself into mainstream, modern life. Still, Curto’s photographs display a beautiful, almost surreal austerity: Mr. Soul (seen left), for example, depicts a farmer whose weathered face emanates strength and rectitude against a wide-open sky.

Image by Fèlix Curto, courtesy of La Fábrica Galería.

The people behind church lawn signs, much like drivers with political bumper stickers, seem to be mixing two very different motivations: On one hand, the signs and the stickers are designed to broadcast a message to others driving by. However, since people are rarely swayed by something read while passing at 30 miles per hour, the messages seem more self-serving. Duncan Nicholls, writing a reader-contributed sermon for the irreverent Christian magazine Geez, explores the motivations behind Christian lawn signs, and comes up with an idea for one sign that could actually get him to walk inside. I’d repeat the message here, but the language is a bit harsh for the purposes of this blog.

Images of nuns in popular culture often involve austere older women, lording over classrooms of inattentive young children. That stereotype is not always undeserved, in a country where the average age of nuns is 70 years old. The Dominican Sisters of Saint Cecilia, however, are changing the face of convents in America, Betty Rollin reported in February for the Religion and Ethics Newsweekly show on PBS. The Nashville, Tennessee-based convent has an average age of 36, and their numbers are growing. Influenced by the former pope John Paul II, a new generation of young women are embracing the ultra-conservative lifestyle practiced by the convent, including days that start at 5 am, meals held in silence, and, of course, strict vows of celibacy.

When the National Geographic Society published a long-lost text dubbed The Gospel of Judas back in 2006, news of the book made headlines in most major newspapers. Based on a codex roughly 1,700 years old and translated in secret by a group of scholars that National Geographic called a “dream team,” the book portrayed Judas Iscariot as a trusted friend of Jesus, rather than the evil betrayer he’s thought to be.

In the two years since the book was published, Thomas Bartlett reports for the Chronicle of Higher Education that a shadow of doubt has been cast on The Gospel of Judas. Serious errors were made in the translation of the text. For example, Jesus refers to Judas as “daimon,” a word the National Geographic team translated as “spirit.” Other scholars have called that into question, translating the word as “daemon,” reinforcing traditional views of Judas as evil. April D. DeConick, a professor of Biblical studies at Rice University, wrote an op-ed piece for the New York Times accusing the National Geographic team of errors that bordered on fraud. She asked of the mistranslations, “Were they genuine errors or was something more deliberate going on?”

Today, The Gospel of Judas is still causing fractures within religious scholarly communities. Members of the so-called “dream team” have even begun to question the work they signed their names to. Some accuse others of bullying them into publishing, while others hurl accusations of profiteering. Bartlett reports that the controversy continues to cause “some on both sides of the argument to feel, in a word, betrayed.”

Barack Obama will continue to face challenges in his occasionally troubled relationship with religion in America—from the Reverend Wright fracas to the (howlingly inaccurate yet maddeningly persistent) rumor that he is a Muslim—Bruce Feiler writes for Beliefnet. In “More Moses, Please, Mr. Obama,” Feiler draws analogies between Moses, “who created the template for how to escape from slavery,” America’s fraught racial history, and Obama’s promise as a reconciler in racial and religious arenas. “At times [Obama] has made his debt to Moses public” with subtle religious language, but Feiler argues that the newly minted Democratic presidential candidate could afford to make Biblical imagery even more overt without alienating his secular followers. It’s an interesting idea for the next phase of Obama’s campaign: a forward-looking prescription for how the candidate might navigate race and faith, two issues that have both plagued and invigorated his campaign. 

The Church of Scientology is an easy target for skepticism and derision. Some like to belittle its founding story, allegedly about an alien named Xenu and hydrogen bombs in volcanoes. Others tell an alternate story about writer and founder L. Ron Hubbard deciding to make up a religion and telling another sci-fi writer, “that’s where the money is.” To me, the eeriest story about Scientology is how it aggressively attacks its critics.

Gerry Armstrong is considered the “Salman Rushdie of Scientology,” profiled in the spring issue of Maisonneuve (article not available online), an “unemployed, penniless man living on a disability pension in the middle of nowhere in British Columbia.” Armstrong was once a member of Hubbard’s inner circle, and he compiled biographic material that contradicted Hubbard’s claims of being, among other things, a nuclear scientist, a civil engineer, and a wounded war veteran. As a result of Armstrong’s vigorous attempts to expose Hubbard, “the Church of Scientology [has] spent nearly three decades trying to discredit and silence [him]…. For Scientologists, it’s like Armstrong has spent time with Jesus or Mohammed or Moses. The only problem is, Armstrong does not worship Hubbard.” In the article, Armstrong claims to have been repeatedly harassed, physically assaulted, and threatened with assassination.

Far from being a turn-the-other-cheek kind of religion, Maisonneuve reports that Scientology condones attacking Church detractors, per Hubbard’s instructions. An internal Scientology tape quoted in the article shows Tom Cruise summarizing how the Church deals with its critics: “confront, shatter, suppression.”

Image by Jason Mouratides, licensed under Creative Commons.

It was only a matter of time before yoga became EXTREME.

—Hannah Lobel

Getting in touch with your spiritual side just got tastier with the release of Geez magazine’s winter Taste Issue. The fiercely independent, Utne Independent Press Award-nominated, Canadian Christian magazine showcases its mischievous yet insightful style, covering social, political, and religious ideas, this time through a food-smattered lens. In the issue, Dan Wiens explores common perceptions of farming and the distance people have created between food and its source. Elsewhere, Barbara Kingsolver discusses growing up in the farming sect of the American "caste system" in an excerpt from her latest book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life. The articles track food from the North American table, through the myriad channels of distribution, and back to production. They also examine the global tremors created by each of these steps. Mmm…gastro politics. 

—Morgan Winters

“I’m drawn to bad news like a moth to a summer porch light” confesses editor Kristyn Komarnicki in the November/December issue of the evangelical Christian magazine Prism. Komarnicki’s confession seems like dreary reading, but her unflinching interest in bad news is tempered by a faith “in God’s power to… transform us through every drop and sliver of anguish that life can hand out.” 

The news that fills Prism’s columns isn’t easy reading: mountains are being destroyed for coal mining, Americans are over-worked and still poor, and teens are getting into abusive relationships—at church. Behind the doom and gloom, however, the magazine’s evangelical message points toward concrete solutions. No matter how audacious the challenge, evangelical Christians are willing to fight, buoyed by a faith that lives and struggles have meaning. You don’t need to be an evangelical, or even a Christian, to appreciate Prism’s strong message of action. Even staunch atheists may be able to find inspiration in the magazine’s motivating message .

—Brendan Mackie