Archive
Mindfulness is as American as Apple Pie
“I want to deal with the chaos in my mind.” “I need to find some stillness and clarity in my mind.” So said two students at the first session of a six-week …
Pentecostal Prayer Gangs: Documenting Religion in a Brazilian Prison
CRCC research associate Andrew Johnson is not a filmmaker, he insists: he conceived the documentary, “If I Give My Soul,” while he was doing research for his sociology dissertation at the University …
Mindful Togetherness
Mindfulness is everywhere. From die-hard new atheists like Sam Harris to tech-gurus like Chade-Meng Tan, it is attracting a surprisingly diverse audience. Like yoga in recent decades, this derivation of a traditional …
Good Vibrations: Sonic Rituals and Sacred Time
“Please come on Saturday morning, by 6:50am to get settled in for the 7-8:30am gathering.” So read the email from Kathryn, one of my research interlocutors, who helps coordinate a small group …
The Wild, Wild West of Mindfulness
Diana Winston’s post-college spiritual journey was something of an anachronism. After she graduated from Brown in the late 1980s, Winston traveled to Southeast Asia, where she spent several years working with Theravada …
Heart of Dharma: Comparing Buddhist Practice, East and West
A dozen or so Vipassana (Insight) practitioners have just ended a session of “sitting” (meditation) and discussion in one of the numerous Insight meditation centers in Los Angeles. In light of the …
Meditation and Authenticity: Everything Old Is New Again
A mindfulness teacher loosely associated with Against the Stream described his unconventional approach to meditation–keep a notebook close at hand to record your thoughts and feelings–as a more faithful reflection of the …
A Meditation on the Nones
Anna Stephens was on a humanitarian mission to Sudan with the International Red Cross when she first read The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment by Eckhart Tolle. For Anna, …
Coachella Valley: Creating Recovery Spirituality for the 21st Century
(Photo by Joanne DiBona) The Coachella Valley communities of Palm Springs, Rancho Mirage, Indian Wells, Cathedral City and Indio share a legacy as retreat centers for the rich and famous, spiritual seekers, …
Axis Mundi: A Little Prayer Group on the Edge of Nairobi
On the Wednesday that marked the midpoint in the recent weeklong Pentecostal and Charismatic Research Initiative (PCRI) conference outside Nairobi, about 30 research fellows and CRCC staffers trundled onto a pair of …
The Soul of Los Angeles
Portraits of Faith, Hope and Social Transformation. Photographs by Jerry Berndt.
Engaged Spirituality 2002: Spirituality and Social Transformation in Mainstream American Religious Traditions
This report by Gregory C. Stanczak and Donald E. Miller is the result of a one-year study on the ways in which individual spirituality may be understood in relation to social transformation. …