Religion

That is what the Bishop of Reykjavik told the “Undersigned” (from then onwards known as “EmBi”: Emissary of the Bishop) in Halldór Laxness’ strange novel Under the Glacier. I had begun reading the book in 2009 and it took me slightly over three years to finish a “simple” 200-pages novel.

On the series

Sunday, October 16, 2011, was a spiritual day for me at Occupy Wall Street. I began the day at the famous Community Church of New York, where Unitarian Universalist minister Bruce Southworth delivered his sermon, "Excellence!" using the Occupy worldwide movements as as fulcrum. What's happening down at OWS, he said, is an explosion of morals. (That's a good thing!)

Texas governor and newly-minted presidential candidate Rick Perry recently made headlines by holding a quasi-religious service in Houston which drew an estimated crowd of 30,000.  Perry called on the crowd to engage in prayer and fasting as a spiritual commitment designed to make God a bigger presence in their lives.

by Paul Sullivan. Originally published by our partner site, World Policy Blog.

[read part one here]

Because the study tour was pre-planned, it was inevitable that these very different cities would thread together in predictable ways: “Fall and Recovery.” However, as I and the other writers on the tour discovered, there were other themes that arose, all related to issues that extended beyond specific regions of the United States. Here, I identify the three most predominant.

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Change

Last night I had the pleasure of partaking in an intimate discussion with Mantle friend Tony Johnson and others about the seeming necessity for humans to have narratives of judgment, rapture, and the finality of life on Earth. From time immemorial, humans have prognosticated and prepared for end times. And time and time again those prophecies of doom have failed to become manifest, leaving true believers scratching their heads, wondering how they could have misread the signals.

Interview with Osagyefo Uhuru Sekou is a reverend at the Lemuel Haynes Congregational Church in Jamaica, Queens. Sekou is the author of the forthcoming Gods, Gays, and Guns and is associate fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies.

At Left Forum 2011, we sat down with scholar and Unitarian Universalist minister Anthony (Tony) Johnson, of the famous Community Church of New York City. We discuss the religious Left in the United States and its role in social justice movements in the Sixties and today.