Powerless and powerful? At the same time? You’ve been diagnosed with lung cancer and told you have two months to live. Powerless, right? The message of Reinhold Niebuhr’s serenity prayer is familiar: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know [...]
Archive for the ‘Religion’ Category
#56 Ode to the “Little Way”
Posted in Religion, Spirituality, Religious Philosophy, Spiritual Exercises, Philosophy of Religion, tagged Saint Therese, the "Little Way", Reinhold Niebuhr, serenity prayer, Monica Furlong, tuberculosis, Catholic Church on December 11, 2011 | 1 Comment »
#54 Wrong beliefs about beliefs
Posted in God, Religion, Religious Philosophy, Theology, tagged GLBT, inter-religious dialogue, Peter Laarman, Religious Dispatches on September 28, 2011 | 2 Comments »
A popular belief among today’s gentle partisans of inter-religious dialogue is that sharing of individual journeys succeeds where other approaches fail. If only this were the case. Except that our beliefs shape our reaction to the experiences of others. The sharing of individual journeys sounds promising, at first glance. What counts as success? —More humane [...]
#52 Prophecies of the end of belief
Posted in God, Religion, Religious Philosophy, Theology, tagged death of God, Johnny Cash, prophecies of godlessness, Puritans, Slavika Jakelic on June 5, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Almost as soon as the Puritans set foot in Massachusetts Bay, they began to sound the alarm that godlessness was at hand. Prophecies of God’s impending demise are as old as the history of European settlements in the United States. Indeed, the recent book, Prophecies of Godlessness, edited by Charles Mathewes and Christopher McKnight Nichols, [...]
#51 Society Without God
Posted in God, Philosophy of Religions, Religion, tagged cultural religion, Lutheranism, meaning of death, meaning of life, secularism on April 1, 2011 | 2 Comments »
The sociologist of religion, Phil Zuckerman, visited the closest thing to Nirvana for those who dream of living in a society without God—Denmark. Zuckerman’s plan to spend several months in one of the most secular places on the planet was driven by his desire to demonstrate that there’s a link between a general lack of interest [...]
#50 Is OCD the source of religion?
Posted in God, Philosophy of Religion, Religion, Theology, tagged Desiderius Erasmus, Martin Luther, Protestant Reformation, Protestantism, Robert Sapolsky, source of religion on March 15, 2011 | 5 Comments »
Martin Luther, the Father of Protestantism, had OCD. So what? Robert Sapolsky, the brilliant professor of biology and neuroscience at Stanford, has made his field accessible and entertaining. But he admits that he sometimes steps beyond his area of expertise–for example, when he prognosticates on Martin Luther, and on the relationship between OCD and [...]
#49 Reporting to God for duty
Posted in Ethics, God, Philosophy of Religion, Religion, Theological Ethics, Theology, tagged Corrie ten Boom, Desmond Tutu, Diana Butler Bass, Dorothy Day, Florence Nightingale, John Newman, Scott Walker, William Wilberforce on March 7, 2011 | 2 Comments »
When it comes to religion, some of us want to have it both ways: when deeply religious people do bad things, we are quick to say that their religious beliefs are to blame, but when deeply religious people do good things, we take little to no interest in their religious beliefs, as if those beliefs [...]
#48 Better than milk: Got God
Posted in God, Philosophy of Religion, Religion, Religious Philosophy, Theology, tagged God, UU World on February 28, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Friends, Long time no read! Her Nakedness has been extra-busy these last few months with pre-dissertation requirements, writing academic papers, and attending conferences. Finally (finally!), full-time research and dissertation-writing are about to begin–with time set aside for blogging. Look for a “real” post before week’s end. But you don’t have to wait to read some [...]
#47 Men, please get as mad as hell!
Posted in Ethics, Philosophy of Religion, Religion, Religious Philosophy, Theological Ethics, Theology, tagged Afghanistan, forward-thinking men, Hamid Karzai, Indonesia, Iran, Nematullah Shahrani, Shia Islam, Sunni Islam, violence against women on August 21, 2010 | 1 Comment »
When women have gotten the right to vote or to divorce or to inherit property or to have legal protection from rape, it’s because men have agreed to change the law of the land. A few forward-thinking women demanded those rights—some nicely, some not so nicely. Allied to their cause was some of the menfolk, [...]
#43 Countdown to exams, gotta go go go
Posted in God, Prayer, Religion, Theology, tagged A. Powell Davies on December 24, 2009 | 1 Comment »
It hardly seems possible, but a full year has passed since my first post! Forty-two posts later, the time has come for me to set blogging aside. With Ph.D. exams scheduled for February, 2010, I must focus on my studies and nothing but my studies. When I launched this blog, little did I expect the [...]