From the shelves of mainstream bookstores and the pages of teen magazines, to popular films and television series, contemporary culture at the turn of the twenty-first century has been fascinated with teenage identity and the presence of magic and the occult.
From being on the margins of scholarly debate for much of the past century and a half, religion is being recognized once again as an area of concern for scholars, politicians, and public policy makers, and thus, the role of religious and spiritual education has taken on a new importance.
Anthropologists have long sought to engage and describe foreign or "e;alien"e; societies, yet few have considered the fluid communities centered around a shared belief in alien beings and UFO sightings and their effect on popular and expressive culture.
John Chryssavgis explores the ascetic teaching and theology of St John Climacus, a classical and formative writer of the Christian medieval East, and the author of the seventh-century Ladder of Divine Ascent.
This unparalleled introduction to cults and new religious movements has been completely up-dated and expanded to reflect the latest developments; each chapter reviews the origins, leaders, beliefs, rituals and practices of a NRM, highlighting the specific controversies surrounding each group.
The authors in this volume explore a wide variety of the contemporary approaches to mystical and religious experience to elucidate what religious experience is, in its own terms, and how its practitioners understand it.
Exploration of the interface between mystical theology and continental philosophy is a defining feature of the current intellectual and even devotional climate.
This book is the first of its kind, addressing key issues in the teaching and learning of spirituality and spiritual care in the context of nursing and midwifery practice.
A valuable resource for students and general audiences, this book provides a unique global perspective on the history, beliefs, and practices of emergent faith communities; new religious traditions; and religious movements worldwide, from the 19th century to the present.
Sufism is a religion which emphasizes direct knowledge of the divine within each person, and meditation, music, song, and dance are seen as crucial spiritual strides toward attaining unity with God.
"e;Few are agnostic about atheism and agnosticism; this eloquent, wide-ranging volume should appeal to many, as well as supporting recent academic interest in its subject.
This volume offers 18 studies linked together by a common focus on the circulation and reception of motifs and beliefs in the field of folklore, magic, and witchcraft.
When Leah Reinhart was six years old, her family moved to an unlikely neighborhood on a hill much like the country—a place where everyone dressed and lived like they were living a real-life Little House on the Prairie.
Arching Backward is the story of an American woman who found herself suddenly and violently immersed in a mystical initiation for which she was not consciously prepared.
'At last, we have a study that tackles these questions, and does so with a wealth of learning, a poet's sensibility and a thorough theological literacy.
A product of the "e;spiritual hothouse"e; of the Second Great Awakening, Spiritualism became the fastest growing religion in the nation during the 1850s, and one of the principal responses to the widespread perception that American society was descending into atomistic particularity.
The Tibetan district of Tsari with its sacred snow-covered peak of Pure Crystal Mountain has long been a place of symbolic and ritual significance for Tibetan peoples.
This book rediscovers a spiritual way of preparing the actor towards experiencing that ineffable artistic creativity defined by Konstantin Stanislavski as the creative state.
At the core of African American religion's response to social inequalities has been a symbiotic relationship between socio-political activism and spiritual restoration.
Exploring European changes in religious and secular beliefs and practices related to life passages, this book provides a deeper understanding of the impacts of social change on personal identity and adjustment across the life course, According to latest research, Europeans who consider religious services appropriate to mark life passages significantly outnumber those who declare themselves as believers.
Cutting across three areas of interest within New Religious Movements - insider perspectives, sociology of religion and the helping professions - this book explores insiders' experience of the Indian Guru-disciple Yogic tradition and is authored by a former member of that tradition.
