“A ritual, if it is truly a ritual and not a gauzy affirmation of the best of life, or a threadbare disdain for the lowly and the prosaic, carries something of the radioactive about it, something of the dark arts.” “Rituals are out at the edge of what is likely, what is familiar. They are … Read moreStephen Jenkinson on Ritual
The incomparable George Carlin explains his conversion to sun worship during his 1999 TV special You Are All Diseased.
Above: Pat Morita in the godawful film version of Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, which omits the Clock People storyline entirely. For your own sake, read the novel instead. The Clock People manage their anarchism (if that is not a contradiction) simply because they have channeled all of their authoritarian compulsions and control mania into … Read moreThe Clock People (from “Even Cowgirls Get the Blues”)
Wayne Martin Mellinger writes on the past and future of religious naturalism, arguing in favor of a more Dionysian, intuitive, deeply playful approach than has often been evident in this niche movement: Abstract The Rise of Religious Naturalism: A New Public Theology of Sacred Nature explores the emergence of Religious Naturalism (RN) as both a … Read more“The Rise of Religious Naturalism: A New Public Theology of Sacred Nature”
Photos courtesy and Kathrynne and Tony Wolf. Recently returned from another week-long stay at Sky Meadow, our soulful home-away-from-home deep in the mountains of Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom. Originally a dairy farm and homestead dating back to the mid-19th century, the 114-acre property has served as a spiritual/nature retreat and permaculture farm since the 1980s. The … Read moreNew Traditions: an Illustrated Memoir of the Sky Meadow Sacred Harvest 2025
An intrepid reporter goes undercover to expose the bizarre “Bread and Puppet” cult in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom mountains … In actuality, the Bread and Puppet Theater is a venerable and beloved mainstay of the Vermont counterculture scene. Hats off to the vlogger for her hilariously convincing homage to conspiracy nut Alex Jones’ infamous “infiltration” of … Read more“The TRUTH About Bread and Puppet”
Eleanor Heartley writes for Art in America: (…) at the advent of the second quarter of the 21st century, a pileup of crises—social, political, environmental, and technological—seems to have all but extinguished the sense of optimism about the future that flared periodically throughout the 20th century. Af Klint’s mysterious, luminous abstractions offer a salve to … Read more“How Spirituality Went from Taboo to Trendy in the Art World”
Brian James of the Howl in the Wilderness podcast speaks with Tony Wolf on the recent Poetic Faiths interview anthology and on the practicalities of embodied philosophy.
August Boatwright (Queen Latifah) tells the story of the Black Madonna to the Daughters of Mary during a homegrown ritual melding Catholic and African traditions, in this scene from The Secret Life of Bees.
Click here to read D.G. Charlton’s illuminating essay on 19th century secular religions, as exemplified by the life’s work of French man of letters Louis-Nicolas Menard.