I have a friend in Wales, who works at How the Light Gets In philosophy festival. As a volunteer for the event, I’ve spent a bit of time with him in the late spring while volunteering at the festival. He is a fluent Welsh speaker in his late 50s. He grew up in Wales, and … More Oes Heddwch? Is There Peace?
So, Governor Cuomo is in hot water for saying that “America was never that great.” Now he is backing down and saying that his statement was “inartful” – whatever that means. I think Cuomo has made a huge mistake, he should never have backed down from his first statement. Instead, he should have doubled down … More America is not Great? I think Cuomo is Right.
My last days of summer mission in the UK involved a week and a half of Welsh language in the National Eisteddfod. The Eisteddfod is a Welsh language, poetry, music, art and culture event. It is the largest event of its kind in the world, and brings over 100,000 Welsh speakers together each year. This … More Learning Welsh, Facing Poverty, and Meeting Pagans in Cardiff
The last two weeks, I have spent time in two deeply spiritual locations: Land’s End in Cornwall, and Avebury – at one of the famous stone henges. These locations have afforded opportunities to develop relationships with people from other faiths and to engage in spiritual discussion and gatherings with them. In Saint Buryan at Land’s … More Land’s End and Avebury: engagement with other faiths
In a recent TED talk techno-sociologist Zeynep Tufekci talked about a developing dystopian culture being fed to us by the advertising on Facebook, YouTube, and other social media sites. She described following a series of YouTube videos about Donald Trump, and how they quickly led to a series of white supremacist videos, which grew in … More Avoiding the Distopian Future
Words, words, words…we are inundated with words. They come as promises. They come as protests. They come as expressions of frustration. Most of us have fallen to one side or another of the debates and word-wars of politics and social issues. And I say “fallen” purposely. We are all either falling for something, or falling … More A Voice from the Dark – Prophets of Exile
Last night, a facebook “friend” went on a tirade over a post in which I critiqued our culture. It was an obscene tirade. It was a stupid – and I am sure – a drunken tirade. Later, I was openly accused of being a supporter of pedophilia and rape by the same person. All this over … More Thou Shalt Be a Hater: The New Cultural Commandment
“To the pure, all things are pure; but to those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure, but both their mind and their conscience are defiled.” (Titus 1:15) Every liberation is followed by a new oppression, or so it would seem in the light of history and human relationships. From Egypt to Babylon … More Our Experience and Our Interpretation of the World Around Us
Today, there was a meeting at Salem State University. The meeting was called, because students wanted to talk about the problem of racism. On the other hand, the Art Department wanted to discuss the issue of the First Amendment and censorship. At stake was an art piece in an exhibit entitled “The State of the … More KKK Art, Salem State, the Problem with America in Microcosm
The country vs. city, white vs. black, millennials vs. the rest of the voting population, those who believed we were better off vs. those who felt things have gotten worse, struggling middle class vs. the rest…these are a few of the battle lines drawn between the two parties in the system vying for our attention. … More Why the Nation is Divided 50/50: National Identities and Political Factions
For me, one of the largest lessons of this election has to do with the ears of America. In a general sense, they are closed. This is not something I did not know, but I have been mildly surprised by the severity of this self-imposed deafness. Before the election of Donald Trump, the left spent … More A President Born from the Sewage of Reality TV: no one was listening
Four days until the world ends. There is no hope. We are left with the options of a trigger happy, power hungry woman who wants to fill our nation with murderous emigrants, or an orange-haired baboon attempting to mimic The Joker with his finger on the nuke button. Make up your sandwich boards now, and … More Politics has Become an Apocalyptic Cult: The End is Nigh!
I am coming to the 10th anniversary of being splattered onto the front page of the Wall Street Journal. The article was entitled, “Befriending Witches Still a Problem in Salem, Mass.” Those were difficult days, and the next four years would be filled with even greater difficulty, but looking back, I can say, I would not … More Befriending Witches Still a Problem: Looking Back, Looking Forward
Before I moved to Salem, MA, I was working on a theory: That Witches are just regular people with an alternative spirituality. So, I took a class in Folk-Religion at Fuller Seminary, and did some anthropological work on American Neo-Pagans. Guess what I discovered?! Yup, that’s right. I discovered the rather non-sensational fact that Witches … More Witches Are Real People Too!
Burning Man is happening in just a few days. Apparently, those in charge cannot imagine the event without me. I have passed on my tickets, but they keep sending me verification that my ticket will be waiting for me a Will Call when I get there. Oh my, don’t tempt me Burning Man peeps! In … More Burning Man is Just Days (and 2,945 miles) Away
Burning Religion 