New Thought youths' optimism on tap, on tape for PBS documentary

New Thought News Service

How do New Thought youths view spiritual tradition and its role in the world?

Millions may have the chance to get a sense of that when a PBS documentary about the Parliament airs, likely in late 2010.

Kell Kearns and Cynthia Lukas of Heaven on Earth Creations from New Mexico taped New Thought News Service team members Joe Murray, Katie Dutcher, Bree Alten, Wes Yarborough and Susana Wolds Tuesday as they took part in a free-form discussion with Jewish youth Benji Holzman and Baha’i youth Gulriz Locina.

Kearns and Lukas, who have been filming participants daily throughout the Parliament, may include the youths’ talk in the Parliament-approved program.

“We ended up talking about how we feel about where society is going,” said Joe Murray, a member of the Hilltop Center for Spiritual Living in Fallbrook, Calif. “We generally agreed that there is a shift that is taking place toward a more socially, environmentally, spiritually conscious community.”

Alten, a member of the Lakeside Community Church in Reno, Nev., flew in from Nepal, where she traveled and volunteered to work in an orphanage for a month, to take part in the Parliament.

The back-to-back experiences have been overwhelming, and have given her a unique vantage point from which to view the spiritual relationships among the world’s faith traditions.

“I was so, not shocked, but impressed with us,” she said of the New Thought youths’ participation in the taped talk. “We knew exactly what to say and it flowed unbelievably well. We’re so on it. It was so professional-sounding.”

Alten credited the group’s shared background in a tradition that values learning and youth participation for the success of the discussion.

“It’s how we were raised,” she said. “When you have a deep practice and a community that supports youth, it’s what happens. I was just really proud of us.”

Participants agreed that the talk reflected youths’ sense that there is positive change afoot.

“There was a definitely positive tone to our conversation,” Murray said. “We’re all very optimistic.

“And we realize that we are the next evolution of society. We are the next leaders. We are the people who will inherit the roles of leadership.”

Above left, producers Cynthia Lukas and Kell Kearns explain the PBS documentary project. Above from left, Bree Alten, Wes Yarborough, Gulriz Locina, Joe Murray, Katie Dutcher, Benji Holzman and Susana Wolds prepare for filming. Photos by Ariane Davis.

"Eating for the YouTube generation" cooks up an alternative

By Bree Alten
New Thought News Service


Consume the facts, and meat becomes pretty unpalatable.
Fact: 17 percent of greenhouse gases are created by livestock; all the vehicles in the world only produce 13 percent of the greenhouse gases.
Fact: 75 percent of all antibiotics produced in the United States are consumed by the animals we eat.
These were among the distasteful tidbits offered up as part of "Compassionate Eating for the YouTube Generation," a talk that made a compelling argument for a vegetarian/vegan lifestyle.
Heng Sure, the Buddhist monk leading the lecture, sparked a powerful reaction among participants and gave 12 arguments for a vegetarian lifestyle, including ethical, health and environmental concerns.
"How much is enough?" was the first question he posed. Sure went on to talk about the emotional, social, political and cultural reasons that people don't want to look at their diets, and why they resist change.
"No one wants to say mom was wrong," he said. "But mom might not have had all the facts."
Given the facts, the question was obvious.
"What should we do about this?" one audience member asked.
Education was Heng's answer. He urged audience members to educate themselves. Among his recommendations: Jonathan Foer's "Eating Animals," Rip Esselstyn's "The Engine 2 Diet," John Robbins' "May All be Fed" and vegsource.com.
Along with education, Sure provided inspiration, in the form of song lyrics: "May all be fed, may all things flourish, may all awaken. Bodhi Svaha."

Life in the newsroom

At right, reporter Olivia Ware 
interviews Tibetan monk 
Khentrul Rinpoche. Middle,
the staff gets organized at 
a morning news meeting. 
At bottom, the news crew 
hustles to meet deadline. 

Scientology 101

New Thought News Service

Mention Scientology and just see how long it takes for someone to chime in with references to well-funded cults, aliens and the mother ship and celebrities jumping on couches.
At the Parliament of World Religions this week, Scientology got equal time.
Rev. Bob Adams, vice president of the Church of Scientology International, discussed the 55-year-old tradition, which is a presence in 165 countries and operates a publishing house. Scientology also maintains several offshoot foundations that work toward a drug-free world, support a prison ministry and run educational programs that help challenged students learn.

Adams described a practical metaphysics based on the idea that each person has a primary urge to survive and will do so at the highest level he or she is capable of. Scientology rates eight levels of functioning, which range from being concerned solely with one's personal survival all the way up to the survival of consciousness as a whole.
Although people often function from the level of reactive mind, which might also be described as ego, they are actually spritual beings with much higher capabilities and levels of experience available, he told his audience. In Scientology, the ideal, or spiritual self, is the "thetan," derived from the Greek letter, theta.
L. Ron Hubbard, founder of Scientology and the theory of dianetics in the 1950s, authored many of the textbooks used by Scientologists. Best known as a writer of science fiction, he was also an engineer, with an engineer's pragmatic outlook, Adams noted.

Adams was not at the Parliament to address Scientology's public relations questions. Instead, with humor and a definite sense of pride, he discussed a worldwide religious movement that has positioned itself as "an applied religious philosophy which offers an exact route through which anyone can regain the truth and simplicity of his spiritual self."

Religions enhance African spiritual traditions

By Alexis Yancey Jaami
New Thought News Service

The King of Benin represents the African traditional religion of Vodun (Voodoo) on Interfaith Action for Peace in Africa.

Curious about the dominance of outside religions in Africa, I went to the seminar, "Interfaith and the Future of Africa," and found only one traditional African religion represented.
That prompted me to ask the panelists how they felt about outside religions being more prominent than traditional religions in Africa. Their answers were intriguing:

Ishamael Noko, general secretary of the Lutheran World Federation: "Athough we changed religions, we didn't change our culture, our relationship with spirit, nature. It's all part of the rich synergy of culture in Africa."

Lally Warren, Spiritual Assembly of the Baha'i in Botswana: "The Christianity I gained complements what I had before. I was raised in my African spiritual traditions and when I learned my new faith, I feel it added to the spiritual tradition I already had."

Margaret Lokawu, United Nations Forum on Indigenous Issues: "Africans still have strong ties to their African religions even though they may have Christian faith. Colonists thought our traditions were satanic, but they give us connection with our spirituality through Mother Earth."

   

Rev. Dr. Setri Nyomi, General Secretary of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches: "We build churches around the shrines of our old religions. You see our spiritual traditions at weddings, funerals, etc. We are Christians but in African clothing."

King Daagbo Hounon Houna II of Benin, of the Vodun or voodoo tradition: "We had to work hard and not lose faith to get our tradition recognized. Our National Day of Vodun is celebrated January 10. You don't have to be scared of this religion or Africa."

The panel members are part of Interfaith Action for Peace in Africa, established in 2002 as the result of an idea generated at the 1999 Parliament in South Africa.
Seven faith traditions are represented: Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Baha'i and the African traditional religion. The organization has helped to open churches, mosques and temples to other faiths, a first in Africa where most people have never been to other places of worship. The group is determined to bring peace to Africa.
"Our land has been troubled," Noko said. "Today we have to find again this peace.  We are born of the same sacred ancestors.  Why do we have to be separated?  We need to be together."
The organization's interfaith activities include communal prayer; the prayers come from all of the religions. And IFAPA has succeeded in preventing some discrimination; no religious tradition currently is banned from gathering in Africa.
IFAPA leaders are determined to reach ambitious goals.
"Africa is not going to be a launching pad for conflict," Noko said. "We're against using scriptures for enemy actions."

For their groundbreaking interfaith work in Africa, the Parliament honored IFAPA with the 2009 Paul Carus Award. The award is named for Dr. Paul Carus, a scholar, writer and publisher in the fields of religion, philosophy and science who was a key figure in the introduction of Buddhism to the West and a prominent organizer of the first Parliament of the World’s Religions in 1893 in Chicago.

Update on the hijab debate

By Alexis Yancey Jaami
New Thought News Service

"What's a mother to do? A mother in the U.S. should not have to have a stranger disrespect her daughter because she loves her faith and wears a head scarf. Or have strangers tell her, 'Your God is not our God. Go back to your country.'"
Powerful testimony at a Sunday Parliament workshop from Janaam Hashim, a Chicago attorney who runs a criminal defense and civil rights law firm with five other Muslim women lawyers. Amal Law Group is the first of its kind in the U.S.

                               Attorney Janaam Hashim explains how U.S. 
                               laws protect religious freedom such as women 
                               who wear hijab.

Hashim says that since 9/11, the U.S. Department of Justice has successfully prosecuted 42 cases of religious profiling against Muslims, Sikhs and Arabs.
The First and 14th Amendments protect religious freedom in the United States, as does the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.
Hashim noted that some states once banned religious garb in public schools, not due to hijab, but because some did not want nuns wearing habits to enter public schools.

"The number one reason I love my country is because I can practice my faith the way I want to," Hashim said.

                               Hijab isn't always black. More and more 
                               Muslim women are wearing bright headscarves.

"Dialogue is the key to moving forward against Islamophobic issues," Musheed Ansari of Australia emphasized in the workshop, titled, "The Headscarf Debates: Religious Dress and Secular Fundamentalism."
Ansari told how an Australian woman expected to be spit on when she wore the hijab, but found the opposite was true, and regretted she thought her people would not respect her.

Australia has made progress on the issue; Ansari showed pictures of a group of Muslim female lifeguards who wear covering from head to toe and of Muslim women wearing the Australian flag as hijab.