How did American Christianity become synonymous with conservative white evangelicalism? This sweeping work by a leading historian of modern America traces the rise of the evangelical movement and the decline of mainline Protestantism’s influence on American life. In Christianity’s American Fate, David Hollinger shows how the Protestant establishment, adopting progressive ideas about race, gender, sexuality, empire, and divinity, liberalized too quickly for some and not quickly enough for others.
Worldwide
Faithful Peace: Why the Journey to Build Resilience is Multi-Religious
Religions for Peace and the Standing Commission on Interreligious Education are proud to launch our latest publication, Faithful Peace: Why the Journey to Build Resilience is Multi-Religious.
With Christian, Hindu, Indigenous, Jewish, Muslim and Sikh theologies, perspectives, and insights, this brilliant and enlightening piece of work explores the importance of multi-religious engagement and why this effort to bring people of all faiths and traditions together, can and does create a more peaceful world.
Prof. Azza Karam, Secretary General and Editor-in-Chief, as well as Programme Officer of Partnerships and Interreligious Education, Dr. Karen Leslie Hernandez and Editor of this publication, invite you to read, learn, think, and thrive in these multi-religious viewpoints from eight Interreligious Education Standing Commission members including – Dr. Pritpal Kaur Ahluwalia, Dr. Luigi De Salvia, Ms. Pascale Frémond, Dr. Johannes Läehnemann, Dr. Anantanand Rambachan, Dr. Lilian J. Sison, Dr. Nayla Tabbara, and Rabbi Dr. Burton Visotzky.
Atmasiddhi Shastra
Atmasiddhi Shastra (Six Spiritual Truths of the Soul) is the work of Srimad Rajchandra of India. It is a simple question-and answer work that engages a conversation between a doubter and a teacher (a guru) about the nature of the soul. Rajchandra was guru to Mahatma Gandhi. The book has forewords given by the XIV Dalai Lama and the Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi.
Interreligious Heroes – Role Models and Spiritual Exemplars for Interfaith Practice
The Elijah institute announces a new book in the Interreligious Reflections series, presenting inspirational leaders in Interreligious relations. This volume was conceived as a tribute to Elijah board member and contemporary interreligious hero, Rabbi David Rosen, on the occasion of his seventieth birthday.
A Rabbi writes: Two Books That Lifted My Spirits in the Time of COVID
On this day of the Jewish New Year – Rosh Hashannah – Religions for Peace Australia greets the Jewish Community with Shanah Tovah!!!, (meaning ‘have a good year). To celebrate Rosh Hashannah in time of Lockdown, we bring you the writing of one Jewish Rabbi who found his spirits uplifted with two books … during lockdown.
Peace in The Age of Chaos: The Best Solution for a Sustainable Future
The much-anticipated book by renowned businessman, global philanthropist and peacebuilder, Steve Killelea, A.M., offers a new and accessible understanding of peace: one that is measureable, resilient and above all, achievable in a time of chaos.
Zealot: A Book about Cults
Jo Thorneley is an Australian writer and the host of a comic podcast, ‘Zealot’. She asserts that she has an obsession about cults, and that is, no doubt, correct. Her book about the zealots who generally establish and profit in one way or another from cults is written in a witty, colloquial, stream-of-consciousness style. It aims to be – and succeeds in being – highly entertaining. It has no pretensions towards being learned or scholarly, but it is well researched and beguilingly thought-provoking.
American JewBu: Jews, Buddhists, and Religious Change
Anyone involved in Buddhism today will nod in agreement upon hearing the claim that there has been a surprising number of Jews in modern Western Buddhism. This is particularly true for Buddhism in North America: not only has Buddhism been a popular choice among people from a Jewish background, but a seemingly disproportionate number have become leading lights of Western Buddhism, and have played a major role in shaping its evolution. It is quite natural to ask the question, why? What’s the connection?
Review: Embracing Auschwitz
I have a cynical friend who claims that there have been more books written about the Holocaust than there were people who perished in it. That is, no doubt, an exaggeration, but it is true that most of the books on this subject sound very much alike. Joshua Hammerman’s Embracing Auschwitz (Ben Yehuda Press) deserves our attention because it is by far the most original book on this subject that has come along in a great many years.
The Lost Art of Scripture
In our increasingly secular world, holy texts are at best seen as irrelevant, and at worst as an excuse to incite violence, hatred and division. So what value, if any, can scripture hold for us today? And if our world no longer seems compatible with scripture, is it perhaps because its original purpose has become lost? Read with Karen Armstrong as she explores the value of scripture in an increasingly secularised world and ponders whether we’ve lost our ability to engage with faith texts as spiritual tools rather than binding rules.
Book Review – What is a Madrasa
The prospects for peace in Afghanistan, dialogue between Washington and Tehran, the UN’s bid to stabilise nuclear-armed Pakistan, understanding the largest Muslim minority in the world’s largest democracy in India, or the largest Muslim population in the world in Indonesia – all require some knowledge of the traditional religious sectors in these countries and of what connection traditional religious schooling has (or not) to their geopolitical situations. Here, Adis Dujerija of Griffith University, Queensland, writes one book review.
My faith is my inner sanctum – not your body politic
Working with religion and religious actors of various hues and shapes is meant to be a humbling experience. At best, an opportunity to learn how those entities and bodies which have long predated secular establishments, served countless people, and continue to do so. At worst, it is meant to be a means of questioning assumptions about all worldviews, and the actions taken based on them.
