“Voting is irrational.” This jarring statement comes from Paul Woodruff, professor of philosophy at the University of Texas in Austin, in his wise book, REVERENCE: Renewing a Forgotten Virtue. Paul came to USC a few months ago, hosted by my office, to give a series of talks. He’s a person who emanates the virtue that he teaches, speaking with a calm, reflective demeanor. Woodruff posits that unless we understand voting as a ritual, we’ll miss the point of it, and continue to see a decline in voter participation.

A typical interpretation when reading the Book of Revelation is John’s attempt to answer the interminable question: How exactly will God, once and for all, set things right? When will the “sorrow and weeping be no more,” and the “tear wiped from every eye?” After reinterpreting over and over again the imminent end that has been repeatedly put on indefinite hold, it merely begs the question, why the postponement?

When Revelation is instead understood to be political commentary spun in the form of a fantastic allegorical tale that can be reinterpreted and applied again and again, the question in each succeeding era has more to do with asking the question: Who is the Whore of Babylon, and all she represents? How can we be so easily seduced? And have the words and life of the Galilean sage been lost, even from the time John had his nightmarish vision to our own succumbing today? Read more.

21st century Christianity is thus wedded to the world view of its 1st century scriptures, its 4th century creeds and its 13th century liturgies. Consequently Christianity presents itself to potential modern believers encased in a series of doctrinal and liturgical forms, undergirded by a theological point of view that communicates almost nothing to those people who gather in church to worship. Why is there any surprise that the number of worshipers is in steep decline? Modern Christianity offers only two alternatives. The first is to close our minds to the explosion of knowledge in order to build a protective fortress around the religious formulas of antiquity.

America maims, oppresses, deeply hurts, and expects no repercussions? I’m saddened that you seem to have forgotten that. Oppressed, beleaguered people react. The Boston experience was just such a reaction – two boys carrying the resentment of many.

The early Church appears to have been satisfied with the simple affirmation ‘Jesus is Lord’, discovering the Spirit in the power of resurrection. Perhaps our task as progressive Christians is to reinterpret these concepts for our present time. I suspect that this will have more to do with discipleship than with the worship of a divine Christ (Matt 7:21).

I grew up reciting the Apostle’s Creed in church. We read it aloud so often that I memorized it without conscious effort, but by my early teen years I began to doubt many of its assertions. Now …

If creeds and statements of faith turn into prisons for an Infinite Mystery, is there a way to express our current beliefs that does not end dialogue and the ability to change as our information changes?

The last book of the Bible, that bizarre and nightmarish Book of Revelation, is often found to be most popular among those religious nut jobs who are constantly interpreting the universal themes found in the battle of good and evil as signs of some certain apocalyptic end time; and differentiating the tribes of those who will be saved from those who will be lost, left behind and damned. However, given the obvious fact such end-time predictions have been re-scheduled over and over again for nearly two thousand years (so far), we might better consider those recurrent, universal themes to be found in this allegorical tale; and look with fresh eyes and see Revelation as more about this world of ours that continues to self-implode upon itself over and over again. How might we be open to being encountered in another, revelatory view of the polis in which we all inextricably dwell? This commentary begins a two-part reflection, based on Elaine Pagel’s newest book, Revelations: Visions, Prophecy & Politics in the Book of Revelation; and in light of the latest terrorist attacks, bombings and global violence among our tribal warring factions. You can find the latest commentary here.

One of the problems of being a professional academic is that generally when you have to write articles they have to be heavy, well-researched pieces that connect with the on-going academic debate in one’s field. Well I don’t really want to do that here. In this short piece I want to try and dream a little, to set out some ways of how we might imagine religious faith that represent an alternative to credal forms of Christianity.

This essay will help you write, lead, or choose a guided meditation. It starts with some simple steps for leading an effective meditation, gives some guidelines for choosing or composing a meditation, then concludes with two sample guided meditations.

We can grow closer to God and deeper in compassion – and we can understand our own traditions better – through more intimate awareness and experience of the world’s religions. Pluralism Sunday, May 5, is a time …

My friend, @SgBz, posts on twitter: “Whatever else prayer may or may not do, the 1st thing it changes is the one praying.” I reply: I agree. I’m not quite as eloquent in 140 characters as I …

We have a choice to make, and that choice will define each of us as a person, and who we are as a country. We experienced an act of terror last week that traumatized our nation and …

(Friends: Please “LIKE” my Facebook page for my new book, HITCHHIKING TO ALASKA – there, you can contribute to an ongoing dialogue about soulful service with your stories and musings. How have you been soulfully served? How …

Why may the majority of scholars be right, that the Bible is not a reliable book of history, although much of its historical sections are indeed based on actual events and real places in the larger picture?

Do you imagine yourself at some point in the future radically changed in nature? For instance, you have always been a risk-taker, someone who lives life large but always assumed that by the time you hit 65, you’d be careful and serene? There’s nothing wrong with changing our minds about who we are or want to be: to develop aspects of ourselves that have been neglected in the past. At least in theory. But in reality, on the eve of turning 65 next week, in the midst of a big life transition, I am rethinking some key assumptions I’ve held about who I would be at 65.

The Conscious Aging Alliance is comprised of several organizations that are making a positive contribution to a new vision of aging

When things get tough, we frankly wonder what kind of courage it will take to grow old and whether we have that courage.