I think your belief structure is childish,” does not amount to persecution. Insensitivity is not the same as harassment or oppression.

Walk into any mosque, temple, church, or synagogue and you will find differing examples, different ways of interpreting God. The One True God is hard to find when a mishmash of human traits is constantly...

outdated social constructs,” and while that is partially true, the social construct stance becomes clear reductionism when it totally discounts clear differences in male and female biology (i.e., androgyny is not the same as equality).

…no matter how liberal a church may seem, Christian dogma still revolves around an ancient, paternalistic image of God the Father, who quite frankly isn’t much more believable than the Easter Bunny or Santa Claus.

Once we got closer to the origins of these Eastern practices, we found that the monks and swamis were just as dogmatic and paternalistic, just as literal and conservative in their approach to spirituality as...

Is our rational and self-reliant generation really supposed to accept the idea that God the Almighty not only created the universe but, interestingly enough, also has a stake in our lives?

These superhero and mythical stories have, in many cases, replaced Biblical stories as vehicles for communal myths, but they are hardly any better than ancient magical adventures tinged with mythical archetypes and the decidedly unnuanced...

The idea of a personal God who protects us, loves us, and then punishes us by not allowing us into Heaven, but instead casts us into Hell for eternity if we haven’t met his standards...

It cannot be denied that as institutions, churches do good work. They operate schools and hospitals. Their charity outreaches, which take care of the homeless, sick, and hungry, have real impacts on communities. And while...

Walk into any church, and you will see people swimming in a sea of emotions (everything from shame and guilt to love and ecstasy). That may be the reason some people think that the more...

This tendency to defend a belief structure is true in all cases, even the rational. Never underestimate our ability to convince ourselves of what we wish to be true, especially if we have invested time...

Growth seems to evolve from a narrow-minded, constricted worldview (selfish) to an ever-more-encompassing worldview (multiperspective caring). To put it simply, the more self-centered you are, the lower you tend to land on these scales, while...

Breaking away from old psychological memes requires a Herculean effort in many cases. In essence, we are outgrowing a worldview while maintaining a relation-ship of sorts. Transcending an ideology can feel like going through a...

If you stick with the definition of spirituality as a peaceful internal state (a.k.a. deep, dreamless sleep while awake), then you will ignore some of the hallucinatory experiences that are bound to happen when you...