Last night I went to Saint Peter’s Square in Rome. I hoped to to see the black smoke of the papal conclave. I figured the dark puff would roil out from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel and the sorry crowd would disperse into the dusk.

I heard the smoke would disperse around 4:30pm so I arrived at the Piazza at 4:00, wrapped in a cheap plastic poncho and sheltered by a pink Hello Kitty umbrella in the spring storm. A crowd amassed, a burgeoning tower of Babel between the many…

Introducing Los Angeles Interfaith Seminary



There is an unstoppable culture of cooperation emerging and many are being called to be part of this momentum. Our communities have a lot to learn from one another. Our global village needs visionary leadership to navigate us toward a world that works for all. We recognize that many want to live a life of service and find ways to make a difference and "be the change” we wish to see in the world. The Los Angeles…

What does it mean to "mobilize" a movement for social justice in the Internet Age? The word "mobilization" has strong associations for the Boomer Generation, when organizing hundreds to march, rally or take part in a sit-in was the visible manifestation of social justice activism.

But to the…

As a father of one–year–old twin boys, and witness to both the love and the antagonism shared between them, I have been granted many an occasion to reflect on how it can be that those with whom we share the most are often those with whom we fight the most. Somewhat unexpectedly, I find my experiences raising twins to overlap in profound ways with recent interfaith experiences.

Nearing the end of my first year facilitating an interfaith class in my United Methodist church, I have found…

Like the master-signifier of reality, the hanging portrait of a prophet hovered in the air of a vacated instruction room, smiling with relief over a group of the elect youth of God's Zion who had been selected by heavenly beings in heavenly places to live in the latter days of human history and to call downtown Salt Lake City their home.

Our fearless leader was a young urban twentysomething who had managed to negotiate the waist of her yellow pencil-skirt by means of a thin, tan belt…

Before meeting Heather, I was a solitary creature, even virtually homeless at one time. I was rarely sociable, preferring the catacombs of my own imagination, the distractions of drugs and alcohol, or the quiet expanse of a local swamp or river as company to the rush and drama of human companions. Yet interactions with others, if they are what each should be, irradiate us, spur change, and help us evolve.

My wife Heather, is my irradiating force.

For nine years, she has…

--"The Pharisees said, This man is not from #God, because He does not keep the #Sabbath" -#John 9:16

It was a Sunday morning in April when a man named Tagg uploaded a picture of his father onto Twitter. “Busted!” the tweet read. “#mitt2012 sneaking a peek at twitter [sic] during Sunday school.”

The attached image displayed a seated man in a crisp navy suit, intently using his…

At a recent meeting of the Commission on Christian Jewish Relations (CCJR) here in Rochester, the members of the Commission were engaged in a painful and difficult discussion, arising out of the controversy that erupted over a letter, signed by leaders of fifteen Protestant religious denominations and organizations that was sent to Congress on October 5, 2012 asking that Israel be held accountable for monies sent to it by the United States in light of what the…

Note: this essay draws on material originally published in two posts on my personal blog,…

“Mom, I’m hungry. Can I have your grapes?”

“Sure,” I replied—even though I’d been counting on that handful of grapes to carry me through the next few hours until dinner. It was Day 6 of my community’s Food Stamp Challenge, for which I’d committed to limit my food spending to the equivalent of “food stamp” benefits, $31.50 per person, for one week—and I was hungry. But I didn’t…

Cross-posted from Historicisms.

One of the more uncomfortable aspects of the "Mormon Moment" for me was seeing LDS scripture deployed against the candidate on whose behalf I chose to exercise my franchise. Wish though I may that the Book of Mormon could be safely sequestered from the sordid world…

When 14-year-old Malala Yousufsai was tragically shot in the head earlier this month by the Taliban, it seemed that the entire world came down with "Malala fever." The wounded Pakistani girl was instantly thrust onto the international stage and one writer even declared her an…

Samhain, also known as Halloween or All Hallow's Eve, is one of our society's most controversial and least understood holy days. Unfortunately, I know this all too well from personal experience.

Last evening as my family participated in a Halloween party at a local restaurant, a young girl (maybe six years old) informed my two daughters in the midst of play that she didn't don a costume because she was a Christian and Christians, according to her, do not celebrate Halloween. My…

Conservative and liberal Christians disagree about a lot of things, but I think the two camps are basically in agreement when it comes to the morality of social safety net programs like TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) and the SNAP program (more commonly known as "food stamps").

These taxpayer-funded social programs are, depending on which subgroup you ask, either a faithful extension of Jesus’ commandment to care “for the least of these” or a form of legalized theft…

Evangelicals deserve attention be­cause of their numbers, global influence, and missional, activist inclina­tions, but they typically believe the practice of inter-faith dialogue would compromise their self-understanding. This article deploys six sets of reasons to persuade them otherwise: biblical precedents for dialogue; a neglected biblical stream concerning the religions; Jesus as exemplar of dialogue given his openness to Gentiles and other “outsiders”; pragmatic and further theological…

This is the first installment in an ongoing series that will explore issues in spirituality through a review of significant symbolic motions, poses, and gestures from a variety of religious traditions.

Throughout human history, the heart’s longing for religious enlightenment has spawned many practices associated with the active contemplation of and interaction with the bodies of selves and others. What can our interactions with the body teach us about the mind, and what…

Need to create an event to promote goodwill among people of different faiths? 

Instead of inviting official leaders to give speeches, try a one -time discussion group. 

EXAMPLE: How to Read Texts of Violence in Islam, Christianity and Judaism

READING: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/philip-jenkins/priests-of-phinehas_b_1253395.html?

WHERE: A local school, library, church,…

I'm posting this on Election Day, because it just occurred to me now. I'm also writing today as the only thing I can write as, sometimes: as a Christian. I hope that those of other faiths can find something in my words, but today, I am musing within my own tradition. Feel free to share how you might consider the same in the comments.

I saw the following video today, discovered through…