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My friends and I were from all sorts of different backgrounds, religions, and traditions, and we accepted this diversity as normal and beautiful." - Gavrielle Blank

STATE OF FORMATION Weekly
Why Monty Python Makes for Good Religion: Reflections on Religion and Film, Part 1/3

By Jenn Lindsay

Humor; humor is difficult.

Religion; religion is difficult.

They can both be reassuring, and discomfiting. They can affix labels, or they can liberate. They can be subversive, or they can uplift the dominant paradigm. Both can be thrilling and boring. They can be unifying, or alienating. Religion and humor both aspire to help us live our lives a little better, more vitally, more happily, more freely; but both can be destructive, violent, petty, unintelligent, and disappointing. Both have so much potential. And both--as all church-shoppers know, and as all failed attempts at humor know--are really hard to get right.

When you get humor right it overtakes you. Same as religion. Both take you out of your body and out of your ego and into a sublime, heightened ecstasy of freedom.

Read more here.

Let the Millennials Speak

By Edward Anderson

My eyes begin to move clock-wise around the circle, pausing briefly to engage with the words and hidden fears of the heterogeneous mixture of individuals that occupied the seats around me. The topic of discourse was two-fold: is the institution relevant and where do we go from here? Intentionally, I begin to ruminate about what my response should be and the experiences that had shaped my perceptions on both pluralism and the institution that had been so essential to my life, religion.

The first conscious encounter that I had with the religious “other” occurred when I was seven years old and made my first Muslim friend. At the time, her religion did not matter to me because, from my perspective, she was nice and willing to play. She was willing to make a connection. The only difference that I did notice at the time was that she was of a different phenotype than me. Over the years, through high school and my matriculation at Morehouse College, I continued to make interpersonal connections with individuals from a range of faiths including Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and many others. With each new connection I engaged the individual as a person that has lived experiences and needing love. This framework of encounter was partly due to the role of my family in Christian ministry and my own civic engagement. Consequently, my greatest moments of epiphany came through my work with my non-profit and my subsequent work as a grant writer for the socio-economic disadvantaged, as well as my work as a Chapel Assistant via my matriculation at Morehouse.

Read more here.

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State of Formation is a forum for emerging religious and ethical leaders. Founded by the Journal of Inter-Religious Dialogue, State of Formation is a project of the Center for Inter-Religious & Communal Leadership Education at Andover Newton Theological School and Hebrew College. It also works in collaboration with the Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions.