#Mindfulness and the View We Take of Things

May 5, 2016 By David Breeden

One on Every Corner There’s a lot of talk about spiritual practice these days. “Mindfulness” is everywhere—I have three apps that claim to encourage mindfulness on my phone. In the marketplace of ideas we have everything from secular Buddhists to religious naturalists. Like Walmart or Starbucks, spiritual practice appears to create demand for itself merely by its ubiquity. But what does a spiritual practice do? Create awareness? Encourage compassion? Increase dedication to task? Reinforce fortitude? Help us lose weight? Make... Read more

Getting Real With Church (or: More Questions Than Answers)

April 28, 2016 By David Breeden

In a recent blog post by marketing entrepreneur Seth Godin called “Supply and Demand” Godin says: “Just because you have a supply . . . that doesn’t necessarily mean you are entitled to demand” (4/23/2016). Godin is talking about business, but is this what is happening as US church attendance drops toward twenty-percent of the population and a rising number of Americans call themselves “nothing in particular”? Is this what is happening with the “spiritual but not religious” phenomenon? They,... Read more

So You Want a #Spiritual Experience? #SBNR

April 21, 2016 By David Breeden

GET YOUR AWE ON Which religion offers the best chance at a spiritual experience? Thirty-nine percent of Evangelical Christians and 47% of Roman Catholics report having had such experiences sometime in their lives, the highest percentages among the religious. (“Spirituality” is a US phenomenon.) But the answer is none of the above. Fifty-four percent of atheists report feeling a “deep sense of wonder” concerning the universe every week, with 70% reporting having experienced a deep sense of awe and wonder... Read more

Y’all Means All: Veto a Bad Bill

April 14, 2016 By jakemorrill

Dear Governor Haslam, This week, the State Legislature sent you a bill to legalize discrimination in counseling. Against the professional ethics that guide therapists, against standards of professional practice, against the will and good hearts of the fair-minded people of Tennessee, the State Legislature allowed the fevers of our times to confuse their good thinking. And now it lies on your desk, awaiting your signature or your veto. I’m writing because I hope you will do the right thing and... Read more

Bingo (and Religion) Exists and Is Everywhere About Us

April 14, 2016 By David Breeden

A RELIGIOUS NON-COMBATANT For some reason, when some folks discover I’m a humanist, they seem to think I want to argue about religion. I don’t want to argue about religion. As far as I’m concerned, religion is a lot like bingo: you’re interested or you’re not. Some people grow up in families or communities that virtually require interest. Some develop an interest for one reason or another. Some, like me, were interested once upon a time due to circumstance but... Read more

A spiritual responsibility for a moral tomorrow

April 12, 2016 By Rev. Deanna Vandiver

In case the not so subtle nuances and coded language around race and class that are pouring out of state legislatures and the presidential candidate nomination races have puzzled you, let us a take a moment to look back to the post-Civil war Reconstruction era. The need for White supremacy and 1%-er capitalism is explicitly explained and defended as essential in 1889 by Andrew Carnegie –1889. “The price which society pays for the law of competition, like the price it pays for cheap comforts... Read more

Humanist Humility

April 7, 2016 By David Breeden

One of the most persistent cliches about humanists is that we are human-o-centric and egotistical. It is true that the term “humanist” sounds like a wild claim for the abilities of the human. It’s also true that humanism contained some rah-rah for human progress a century ago. But it’s good to remember that humanists accept the contemporary understanding of evolution, which tells us that we evolved on the savannah of Africa. That has implications. Therefore, humanists assume that we humans... Read more

Letter to the Editor

April 5, 2016 By Rev. Deanna Vandiver

Louisiana is the most incarcerated place in the world. Let’s truly sit with that for a moment. And then, dear friends, let’s do something about it. We know that we do not deserve to spend our precious lives in prison – either as prisoners or as jailers. Let’s choose to stop trying children as adults. Today is the day to #RaiseTheAge. Let’s stop retrying adults who were incarcerated as children due to police coercion. Today is the day to end... Read more

What’s the Beef with Purple Cows? On Logos and Mythos

March 31, 2016 By David Breeden

What’s the difference between a poem and a mathematical equation? Say, between Einstein’s E=MC2 and what is purported to be the shortest poem, “Lines on the Antiquity of Microbes,” but better known as “Fleas” by Strickland Gillian: Adam Had ‘em. Though I am innumerate, I understand that equations may be good math or not and sometimes reveal something about the nature of the universe. Einstein’s equation has practical uses. A poem cannot be either proven or not proven. We can... Read more

Cutting Some Slack for Integrity

March 24, 2016 By David Breeden

Reformers. Protestants. Heretics. Loudmouths. William Tyndale’s (1494-1536) crime was translating the bible into English. Tyndale said, I defy the Pope and all his laws. If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause se a boy that drives the plow to know more scripture than he (the Pope) does. God—or at least the authorities in Brussels—did not spare Tyndale and he was strangled then burned at the stake. One of his crimes was to translate the Greek word “ekklesia”... Read more