Where do atheists, agnostics, and non-religious people turn for spiritual guidance? At Tufts University, non-religious students think they should have their own “humanist chaplain,” the same way that schools enlist Jewish, Christian, or Muslim teachers for their students.

“The current chaplaincies just don’t address the needs of [non-religious students],” Xavier Malina, president of the Tufts Freethought Society, told Inside Higher Education. “A lot of students might want spiritual guidance but don’t feel comfortable going to the available chaplains on campus, [who] might not satisfy their spiritual needs.”

Harvard University, Rutgers University, and Adelphi University all currently retain humanist chaplains, according to Inside Higher Education, though some people take issue with the entire idea. Don Brewington, president of the National Association of College and University Chaplains, told the magazine that providing non-religious students with guidance seemed valid. But describing humanist guidance as “spiritual,” according to Brewington, “seems to be somewhat contradictory.”

Source: Inside Higher Education 

Image by  Elephant Wearing Striped Pants , licensed under  Creative Commons .

The Canadian feminist magazine Herizons reports on a museum-in-progress that’s setting out to honor mothers and their stories: the Museum of Motherhood.

“Mother-blaming and objectifying women has created a lot of damage,” museum cofounder Joy Rose tells Herizons. “We need to dig deep into the well of our subconscious when it comes to our attitudes about mothers. Our society needs to make a major shift.”

For now, the museum exists online (at www.museumofmotherhood.org) while Rose and her colleagues raise money and look for a space in upstate New York. They’re using the website to gather testimonials about mothers and motherhood, which they plan to use in their inaugural exhibit.

(The article is not yet up on the Herizons website, but you can read a fairly legible scanned copy at the Museum of Motherhood's website.)

Source: Herizons

Image by hans s, licensed under Creative Commons.

At 16 years old, Jason Perez was dealing drugs in his Massachusetts neighborhood. By the time the documentary New Muslim Cool begins, Perez has converted to Islam, changed his name to Hamza Perez, and moved to Pittsburgh to start a Muslim community. The film tracks Perez through intimate and important episodes of his life, including his wedding to a Muslim woman and the birth of their first child. Every moment evokes a larger theme of what it means to be Latino and Muslim in post-9-11 America.

Perez, like many Latinos, grew up Catholic. His mother is quoted in the film talking about the family’s struggle to reconcile her son’s faith with the rest of her Puerto Rican family. With his conversion to Islam, Perez is no longer able to eat the lechong, the roasted pig, which is popular in Puerto Rico.

Conversion to Islam doesn’t mean giving up on Puerto Rican culture, however. As one half of the hip hop duo, the Mujahadeen Team, Perez and his brother Suliman mix Latino and African American influences, often with strong Islamic messages.

Not everyone has found the conversion to Islam as natural as Perez’s. An article for the Brooklyn Rail profiles various Latino converts to Islam and the struggles they’ve encountered. Some Latinos have been made to feel unwelcome in certain Mosques, where speaking Spanish was looked down on. Some Latino families profiled in the piece have refused to accept their children’s conversions to Islam, in one case continuing to serve pig products, knowing of the dietary restrictions.

Estimates vary on the number of Latino Muslims in the United States. According to a Voice of America article from 2007, there are anywhere between 70,000 and 200,000. The group still represents a small minority within a minority, but people like Perez aim to change that by converting more people to Islam.

The Brooklyn Rail quotes Alex Robayo, the host at a Hispanic Muslim Day, who tried to emphasize the similarities between Catholicism “You may say in Spanish ‘dios,’ in English ‘God,’ in Arabic ‘Allah. Is dios and God different?” Robayo added, “Dios es grande.”

Watch the trailer for New Musilm Cool below:

Source:  New Muslim Cool ,  Brooklyn Rail  

Image by Kauthar Umar.

Sometimes it’s smart to play the fool. There are three types of fools, Michael Dirda writes for In Character: real, professional, and unsuspecting. Shakespeare’s King Lear thinks himself wise, until his best plans fall apart and he realizes that he is an unsuspecting fool. Professionals fools include con men, jesters, and other hucksters who “aims to reinforce his client’s conviction of his own superiority.” And the unsuspecting fools are the innocents, the idiot savants, the “saintly or holy fools” who “possess a primitive, almost prelapsarian goodness.” They’re also the ones most apt to speak up and say, “the emperor has no clothes!”

Source: In Character