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A “christening” type of ceremony for a family that did not want to use traditional baptism terminology.

2) The Hebrew scriptures, or the Old Testament, represent a religious tradition that is independent of the later Christian faith. The Hebrew scriptures aren’t about Jesus, although the Christian scriptures include many references to the Hebrew scriptures. To honor the fundamental differences between the two sets of scriptures doubles the spiritual significance of the entire Bible.

This poem results from my week of intense conversations with friends and students about the nature of life, death, and grief.

Rev. Jim Burklo is the Associate Dean of Religious Life at the University of Southern California. An ordained United Church of Christ pastor, he is the author of books on progressive Christianity: OPEN CHRISTIANITY: Home by Another Road and BIRDLIKE AND BARNLESS: Meditations, Prayers, and Songs for Progressive Christians. His latest book, HITCH-HIKING TO ALASKA: The Way of Soulful Service, will be published late in 2012. You can read his weekly blog, “Musings”, at www.tcpc.blogs.com/musings , and his personal website is www.jimburklo.com .

“Open Christianity” maintains that yes, you can leave behind that which has ceased to make sense, and still be very Christian.

A particularly useful book crossed my desk recently: Bridging the God Gap: Finding Common Ground Among Believers, Atheists, and Agnostics (Living Arts Publications, 2011) by Roger Schriner, a retired Unitarian minister and psychotherapist from Northern California. In it, he describes the wide continuum of nuanced positions between “theism” and “atheism”, blurring the meaning of both terms.

Malhotra argues for a distinct Indian alternative to the assumption that Western constructs should define and describe the whole world. His book is an eye-opener, if we recognize the inner vision that can see the seldom-examined presuppositions we use to define and categorize the world.

Mountain-shaped silhouettes
Mark the the tall pale stalk
Of a spent yucca:
Are these its last lines of praise
For the land where it stands?

“An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics,” said Plutarch, the 1st century Roman historian. Our country may not be on its deathbed, but surely we are now experiencing the pain of a serious sickness in our democracy.