Category: Challenges
Was the deadly Sikh temple shooting in Oak Creek, Wisconsin a mistake?
Re-published with permission from the author. Original Source: Washington Post. It has been one month since the deadly shooting at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wis., caught the attention of our entire ... Read More
Why Jesus’ wife matters to me
The writing prompt in this week’s digest to State of Formation scholars asked, “Does it matter that Jesus may have had a wife?” I was surprised by the strength of my own response: a gray, hard-... Read More
Encountering the Painful Past in the Present: A “Cloudy Water” Spirituality of Remembering the US-Dakota War of 1862
This year marks the 150th anniversary of the Dakota-U.S. war which resulted in the execution of 38 Dakota men in Mankato (MN) on December 26,1862. It remains the largest mass hanging in U.S. history. ... Read More
The Hiker and the Climber – The Allegory of the Mountain
Fellow SoF Scholar Tom Peteet wrote about his encounter with a Muslim boy upon visiting a mosque in the Blue Mountains of Southern India. A question elicited an answer and a back and forth ensued betw... Read More
The Limitations of Free Speech – Part 1
For those of us working in the field of intercultural dialogue and understanding, it has been a frustrating few weeks. Just as you think progress is being made between communities, global events peg y... Read More
The little-known eleventh commandment: Get over yourself
The thing about diversity is that, if people are being intellectually honest, tensions will arise from time to time. The brochures that talk of rich learning opportunities don’t tell you that the ph... Read More
“Beyond Gay or Straight, Beyond Black or White, Beyond Christian or Jew: A Recovery of the Person as the Locus of Human Identity for Theological Anthropology” by Matthew Zaro Fisher
How does religion elucidate human nature, and how does this factor into the rich experience that is our national and global community? On the one hand we are all different. We all come from different ... Read More
What is Holy to Others
I do not pretend to understand how an asinine video like “The Innocence of Muslims” can drive crowds to violent and even murderous anger. Many commentators insist that the ultimate cause... Read More