One of these days I’ll complete my Cathedral pilgrimage post. I promise! The next week and a half is going to be crazy, as I prep responses to papers for the upcoming Sunstone West Symposium, gear up for a work project deadline, and try to catch up on my papers and readings for my grad [...]

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Friends and coworkers have come up to me in the past week wanting to talk about the Gospel of Judas. “John,” they say, “you hear about this Gospel of Judas? I guess he was told by Jesus to betray him.” My boss was more skeptical, and suggested that Judas or his followers were trying to [...]

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Yesterday was my second day back to church (my own home church, the local LDS ward) in three months. Now that I think about it, “I went back to church” is kind of an odd thing to say, considering that I‚Äôve been aggressively visiting a variety of churches for the past few months. Overall, it [...]

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I think it a hugely ironic that a post that focused largely on conflict resolution gave birth to one of the most contentious conversations on MoF. In spite of it being my son’s birthday, I spent considerable time thinking about the thread (in the shower, while driving, on my run). I’m going to do a [...]

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I rode the train to downtown Los Angeles last week. East-coasters will think this natural; Angelinos will wonder why I didn’t drive (one answer: cheaper than parking in LA). My purpose: a triple pilgrimage to the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, the old central branch of the Los Angeles Public Library, and the [...]

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I’m not doing very well on religious posts this week. I have at least two fun pilgrimage sites (in LA, not OC) to write about–hopefully in the next few days. In the meantime, I’ll leave you all with one of my favorite Buddhist prayers: May I become at all times, both now and forever A [...]

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On my drive back from class in Long Beach tonight (in a rare Southern California downpour), I got to thinking about my connections to UC Irvine. Jana and I met and married here as undergrads and had our first child here. I live and work on campus. Jana is a grad student (her department is [...]

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I’m going to try to create links to these songs on Tuesday. Stay tuned! 1. Scarlet Ribbons (based on Harry Belafonte version) 2. She don’t Use Jelly (Ben Folds Five cover) 3. Spiderbite (The Flaming Lips) 4. Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Pt. 1 (also by The Flaming Lips) 5. I am the Walrus (The [...]

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It’s late, and I’ve still got a hundred pages of reading to do for class tomorrow. If you check back in a day or two, I should have links for the games (and songs for the previous post). Memoir ’44 Post D-Day WWII game. My strategy: to bore my son into a tearful retreat with [...]

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I’m in the middle of Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence. It’s a sordid read, full of the worst violences that humans can inflict on each other, but it’s compelling because: a) the author, Mark Juergensmeyer, interviews terrorists, those who follow them, and the religious leaders who provide theological [...]

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