Fiqh Council of North America issues fatwa against airport body scans:
“It is a violation of clear Islamic teachings that men or women be seen naked by other men and women. Islam highly emphasizes haya (modesty) and considers it part of faith. The Quran has commanded the believers, both men and women, to cover their private parts.”
via Portland Humanist Examiner, via USA Today, via Free Press
Gizmodo reports on Apple’s newest retail store on the upper west side of Manhattan. Â The article is called “Inside Apple’s Newest Temple” and in it the author writes:
I call it a temple because the architecture conveys a nearly religious aesthetic, a place to worship Apple, beyond any other Apple store you’ve ever been to. The top floor’s a vast open space, enclosed by spartan stone walls which support a massive glass ceiling. The rows of tables in the main room feel like pews.
The McDonald’s “Talking Filet-O-Fish” commercial opens with a wide shot of a garage. A heavy, bearded man sits with a McDonald’s bag and drink on the table in front of him. He seems comfortable, content, and average as he holds a sandwich in his hand. When he takes a bite of the sandwich the shot cuts to a close up of a taxidermy fish mounted on a wooden plaque on the wall. The fish bends in half, making an hyperbolic mechanical sound, and looks right at the camera as it begins to sing:
“Gimme back that Filet-O-Fish.
Gimme that fish!”
As the fish continues, the camera cuts to back to the man who is shown bobbing his head with the tune and chewing on the sandwich. He is sitting on a weight lifting bench next to a motorcycle. The fish continues singing:
“Gimme back that Filet-O-Fish.
Gimme me that fish!”
Another man walks into the garage carrying a drill – perhaps returning it to his friend. He stops and looks with astonishment at the fish and then at his friend sitting on the bench eating the sandwich. The fish continues to sing:
“What if it were you hanging up on this wall?
If it were you in that sandwich,
you wouldn’t be laughing at all!”
Just as the fish sings, “If it were you in that sandwich,” the camera cuts to the man chewing. (more…)
I came across “Slayage: The Online International Journal of Buffy Studies” today. It’s difficult to look at any neo pagan online community without finding frequent references to Joss Whedon’s television series “Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” One of the most often used quotes about wicca, for example, is this exchange between the characters Willow and Buffy after Willow has attended a meeting of her college wiccan group:
Buffy: So not stellar, huh?
Willow: Talk. All talk. Blah Blah Gaia. Blah Blah Moon…menstrual life force power thingy. You know, after a coupla sessions I was hoping we could get into something real but . . .
Buffy: No actual witches in your witch group?
Willow: No. Bunch of wanna-blessed-bes. You know, nowadays every girl with a henna tattoo and a spice rack thinks she’s a sister of the Dark Ones.
The effect of films like “The Craft,” “Practical Magic,” and the television series “Charmed” and “Buffy…” is far reaching. Social networks, retail suppliers and bloggers adopt a posture either in favor of or opposed to these depictions and construct identities in line with or opposed to them. There seems to be very little terrain online that hasn’t been touched by “slayage.”
Mitch Horowitz writes about Psychiana, a “mail order” New Thought religion created by Frank B. Robinson in 1928. Robinson ran the religion from his office in Moscow, Idaho.
“Robinson was probably the first religious figure of the twentieth century to fully grasp the power of advertising and mail-order marketing. But he was more than just that. With only a deeply held conviction and a few hundred dollars in ad money, he brought attention to the neglected needs of millions of people who wanted religion to provide practical guidance in daily life.”
“Titled “The Pope Meets You on Facebook,” the new Pope2You application lets people send and receive “virtual postcards” of Pope Benedict along with inspiring text culled from the pope’s various speeches and messages.”
Via Cult of Mac, via Catholic News.
I asked the writer to recount their experience of visiting a “contemporary” church in Arkansas, Easter 2009. The photograph they showed me of the coffee shop was so interesting, I wanted to know more. Here is what they sent me:
The last time I went to church it was in a bar in Brooklyn. Yesterday I went to a “contemporary” protestant “non-denominational” church in Arkansas with my mom.
This church is fairly new but the “style” is inceasingly popular in the southern United States. There is considerable debate about the goals and outcomes of such churches: “… I see a blatant capitulation to consumerism in much of this direction. Many experts in this movement do not hesitate to call their techniques “marketing methods,” but this approach breeds an unhealthy individualistic consumerism, which is already pervasive throughout the culture, when Christian leaders treat church growth as the primary activity of the Lord’s Day, and the congregational worship service as a virtual business undertaking aimed at getting consumers to “buy the product.” (John Mark Ministries)
(The “coffee shop”)My first reaction to the physical architecture of the church is that it looks like a mall. The main entrance is a coffee shop aimed at creating a social space. I learned later in the service that new guests can trade in their comment/registration card for a hazelnut latte.
The congregation seems to be comfortable in such a mall culture. Many women have trendy, tight fitting dresses, 13 year-olds wear high heels, men and women have bleached hair and tanned skin, and the male uniform seems to be khakis and blue shirts. All of this combined to make me feel terribly uncomfortable.
The service begins with 20 minutes of rock music. The band has a drum set, an electric keyboard, a lead singer/guitarist, a bass player, a back-up singer/tambourine player, and an acoustic/electric guitarist. My grandmother regularly complains about them.
The pastor’s message included a warning to avoid “humanistic” ways that lead one to buy in excess and focus on “the flesh”. If one is “with Christ” then one will focus on internal, spiritual goals rather than the “humanistic”. During the closing prayer the keyboard player played instrumental inspiring music that increased in volume and tempo as the prayer closed. As the prayer ended the projected screen had swirling colors similar to itunes visualizer.
Are there thoughts that are not permitted by the software of the brain?
Human rights depend on Animal rights. We can never have liberation of humankind without the same for all of animalkind. So long as we enslave, we will never be free.
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Interview with Davis during Loris GrĂ©aud’s Cellar Door installation.
“U.S. Chief District Judge Mark Wolf ruled this week that the Department of Correction violated federal law protecting religious freedom and ordered the department to provide Daniel Yeboah-Sefah a diet in line with his Buddhist beliefs.”
Genetic storefront opens in SoHo.
