An Atheist in the Pulpit: James McAllister, a 56-year-old Lutheran minister in the midwest, was working on his sunday sermon one Thursday afternoon last summer. It wasn’t going well. The reverend wasn’t suffering from writer’s block—in fact, he was crafting quite an elegant parable about “the importance of making our whole lives a prayer.” No, the problem was bigger than that. The sermon skated around a private truth that McAllister could no longer deny. [Psychology Today]
Spiritual revolution of Hindu women: In Hinduism, women are considered a form of energy and are given due importance at every stage of life - as a daughter, as a daughter-in-law and as a mother. Out of these roles some come out as women gurus. [New Statesman]
The rebirth of religion and enchanting materialism: Europe is the exception to the global de-secularization of politics; at the same time, theoretical interest in theological issues has been rising in Europe over the past fifteen years. Placing Habermas’s “soft naturalism” against the “militant atheism” of Michel Onfray and Richard Dawkins, and borrowing Diderot’s concept of matérialisme enchanté, Sven-Eric Liedman warns against trivializing life’s wonders, be they of a technical nature or beyond our present conception. [Eurozine]
Fundamental change: Both politically and theologically, conservative Christianity is now a militant and rapidly growing force, in Britain and globally. [New Statesman]
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