Quest Blog
The Playground Atheist Looks Back
2013-11-18 It may be that every elementary school, across the whole South, has at least one self-appointed Playground Atheist. You know the type: when all the other kids are showing off their new “WWJD” bracelets and mooning about how cool the youth pastor is, there’s a sharp-eyed fellow, standing there by the slide, not believing…
Read MoreSongs that Save Us
2013-11-19 Emma’s Revolution came to New Orleans and offered a workshop focused on singing and songwriting for social justice last weekend. I am still reeling a bit from process. Yesterday I caught myself humming a song and wondered “whose song am I singing?” With a flash of wonder, I realized that it was mine. It…
Read MoreLiving History: How JFK’s assassination woke me up
2013-11-19 I was sitting in a small desk, and Mrs. Graham was at the front of Room 3 in Overbrook School in Charleston, West Virginia, the day that John F. Kennedy was shot. Randall Hainey’s mom came running in the side door with a transistor radio to tell us. Handing out lined paper, Mrs. Graham…
Read MoreThe Four Yogas and Transcendental Humanism
2013-11-21 A group from the local Hindu temple recently contacted me about jointly celebrating the 150th birthday of Vivekananada, the Hindu priest who took the World Parliament of Religions by storm back in 1893 and introduced Vedanta Hinduism to the Western Hemisphere. Vivekananda spoke at the congregation where I serve as senior minister, the First…
Read MoreWhere Were You When…?
2013-11-22 There are times in history that imprint themselves on our psyche, events that seem to change the order of the Universe. For some it was the bombing of Pearl Harbor, for others 9/11. For me, it is the memory of being in a car with some Brandeis friends driving to Cambridge for a Friday…
Read MoreTo Becoming Silent
2013-10-24 by Pablo Neruda (translation by David Breeden) Now, let’s all count to twelve, then keep still. For once on this earth, let’s speak in no language. For once let’s stop and not move our arms so much. That would be a fragrant moment, without hurry, without movement; we would all be together in an…
Read MoreThe Lights of Diwali, and Also the Dark
2013-11-03 Everyone has to make a living somehow. Some weekends, my job has me blessing unions in the name of the Holy. All kinds of people end up finding each other. Once, it was somebody raised in the Black church tradition marrying someone whose family had been Hindu since before time began. So out I…
Read MoreMessy & Beloved? Yes.
2013-10-29 Beloved Community is ever on my mind lately, both who we are and who we can be. My meditations are guiding me toward increasing clarity about my vision of Beloved Community – it cannot be a state of perfection. Because humans are essential elements in Beloved Community, it is/will be cluttered and messy if…
Read MoreRun Away! Run Away! Fear and the Problem of Progressivism
2013-10-31 Let’s face it, progressives just don’t do fear well. Conservatives go to town with death panels and black helicopters, while progressives build arguments. It’s true in religion; it’s true in politics: progressives live in Reasonville while conservatives scare the hell into people. Take, for example, Pascal’s Wager, one of the enduring arguments concerning the…
Read MoreThe Language of Faith
2013-11-01 Last Sunday, while out to lunch with my husband and two young kids, we passed the time waiting for our food by playing Mad Libs. As you might remember, Mad Libs is a word game where one player asks another player to provide a particular kind of word – noun, verb, adjective, etc. –…
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