Author Craig Chalquist on Lamplight, the religion of his Assembling Terrania Cycle of stories: Even more than readers, writers find themselves astonished by unexpected plot twists. In the story “Ten Lamps,” a mysterious philosopher named Simeon writes down ten cosmic operating principles that work at any scale, even inside us. One of these Lamps declares … Read moreLamplight
Chris Letheby writes for Psyche: Mystical-type experiences are the phenomena that people most commonly feel to be spiritual. So, if we want to know whether spirituality is necessarily always focused on non-naturalistic ideas, one obvious approach is to ask people who’ve had such an experience what it meant to them. Qualitative researchers have done this, … Read more“Psychedelics show religion isn’t the only route to spirituality”
Ross Barkan writes for The Guardian on the strange meldings of the nascent neo-Romantic movement: Not all of the old romantics were opposed to Judeo-Christian religion, but they were drawn, like the youth of today, to spiritual realms that operated far beyond any biblical teachings or rationalist precepts. They were deeply wary of technology’s encroachment … Read more“The zeitgeist is changing. A strange, romantic backlash to the tech era looms”
An excerpt from the ever-increasingly-iconic Erik Davis’ 2006 essay on emergent cultic activity at Black Rock City: Thus it is with some trepidation that I turn to one of the more vexing questions that one might ask about Burning Man: can or should we speak of the event as a sacred gathering? Even if we … Read more“Beyond Belief: The Cults of Burning Man”
Arielle Domb writes for Cosmopolitan on the Satanic Temple’s telehealth abortion service: Never mind that Satanists don’t actually worship the devil. There are no ritual sacrifices or quests for supernatural powers at TST. In reality, Satanism is a nontheistic faith in which TST’s roughly 1.5 million global members view Satan more like a mascot, one … Read more“The Satanic Abortion Clinic That’s Pissed Off Pretty Much Everyone…and Might Beat the Bans Anyway”
Substack blogger Octopusyarn writes on metamodern religion: Being self-aware of its constructedness, a metamodern God concept needs to be able to sustain critique. Daniel Görtz describes this concept of a headless God as follows: “It is a God whose altar can be pissed upon, is insulted again and again, yet remains sacred, is resurrected. (…) Always on … Read more“A Headless God or religion for our times” (The Structure of Metamodern Religion 1/3)
From Ursula K. LeGuin’s 1976 essay “Myth and Archetype in Science Fiction“: Where intellect fails, and must always fail, unless we become disembodied bubbles, then one of the other modes must take over. The myth, mythological insight, is one of these. Supremely effective in its area of function, it needs no replacement. Only the schizoid … Read more“Myth and Archetype in Science Fiction”
Blogger Felonious Monk writes on the potentials of ethical cults: When you look at the downfall of most cults, it almost always relates to the very thing that cults ask their members to give up: ego. And specifically, the ego of a leader who has become drunk on his (usually) power, treating members as his … Read more“We need a better class of cult”
Mark Wilding writes for VICE on Gudni Gudnason’s Modern Mystery School: The school describes this network as an “international community of lightworkers, initiated in an ancient tradition of service, compassion and empowerment”. Its critics, including numerous former students, describe it as a cult and a spiritual pyramid scheme, whose members face psychological trauma, spiralling debts … Read more“Inside the Spirituality ‘Cult’ Whose Members Allege Sexual and Financial Exploitation”
Philosophy professor Philip Goff writes for Psyche on the perspectives of practicing agnosticism and religious fictionalism: It is common to assume that religion is all about belief. Religious people are ‘believers’. Muslims believe that God revealed the Quran to Muhammad; Christians believe Jesus rose from the dead; Buddhists believe in cyclical rebirth and the non-existence … Read more“Why religion without belief can still make perfect sense”