Podcast: What do Cats Have to do with Interfaith Work?
(-ish)(-less)(-ness)(-loathing): The Self/Soul and The Insidiousness of Mass Violence
I remember, over a decade ago, the first time I encountered the Wiccan Rede. Eight words the Wiccan Rede fulfill, An it harm none do what ye will I thought that made sense; felt, somehow, that for all... Read More
The Benefits of Meditation for Breaking Attachment to Unmindful Routines
When the World Trade Centers were attacked on September 11, 2001, I was standing in line at the Tucson, AZ airport, waiting to check in so that I could return home. Standing in line, oblivious to th... Read More
Planting Figs; Crossing Borders
Recently, I came across this poem by Naomi Shihab Nye, a Palestinian American poet. It’s a poem about her father, a Palestinian who lost his home in Jerusalem in the war of 1948 and came to the Unit... Read More
Social Justice is a Loaded Term
“If you have come here to help me, you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.” – Lilla Watson Although the abov... Read More
Ramadan – A lesson in Reconciling Relationships
For many Muslims worldwide, the 6th of June marks the first day of Ramadan, the observance of the fasting (from food, water and innate desires) between sunrise and sunset. Muslims will faithfully ob... Read More
We Are Brothers: Deepening the Conversation between American Jews and American Muslims
The appointment of Bob Silverman by the American Jewish Committee as the first official Jewish ambassador to the American Muslim community, as reported here by Lauren Markoe of the Religion News Servi... Read More
Stop Sympathizing and Start Supporting: A Close Look at What Moves us to Advocacy, Part 2
If you read Part 1 of this article, you have become acquainted with the members of the Rural Women’s Movement, many of them unmarried mothers who participate in my research project on the strugg... Read More
Wedding Cakes and Religious Pluralism
One of the first religious experiences I had as a teenager seeking a spiritual teenager was attending a Reform Jewish temple in St. Joseph, Missouri. The temple’s members were mainly elderly people,... Read More
Stop Sympathizing and Start Supporting: A Close Look at What Moves Us to Advocate, Part 1
We drive down a dusty, overgrown mountain road, and I wonder how the low clearance between my four-cylinder rental’s undercarriage and the uneven mounds of earth have not scraped the oil pan from my... Read More