Fear has taken on an outsized role in our current cultural and political context. Manufactured threats are advanced with little to no evidence of danger, while real threats are exaggerated for self-interested gain. This steady diet of fear produces unhealthy moral lives, leading many Christians to focus more on the dangers we wish to avoid than the goods we wish to pursue. As a fearful people, we are tempted to make safety our highest good and to make virtues of suspicion, preemption, and accumulation. But this leaves the church ill-equipped to welcome the stranger, love the enemy, or give to those in need. This timely resource brings together cultural analysis and theological insight to explore a Christian response to the culture of fear. Laying out a path from fear to faithfulness, theologian Scott Bader-Saye explores practices that embody Jesus's call to place our trust in him, inviting Christian communities to take the risks of hospitality, peacemaking, and generosity. This book has been revised throughout, updated to connect with today's readers, and includes new discussion questions.

Evil Eye, Jinn Possession, and Mental Health Issues raises awareness of the cultural considerations, religion and spirituality involved in the assessment of Muslim patients with mental health problems. The belief that Jinn spirits can cause mental illness in humans through affliction or possession is widely accepted among Muslims, meaning this belief is a crucial, but frequently overlooked, aspect of mental health problems with Muslim patients in psychiatric care. This book explores the nature of such beliefs, their relationship to mental health and the reasons for their importance in clinical practice. The book argues that it is vital to consider mental disorders as a multifactorial affair, in which spiritual, social, psychological and physical factors may all play a role. It suggests differential diagnostic skills may have an important part to play in offering help to those who believe their problems are caused by possession, and provides accessible literature on clinical issues and practice, interventions, management and evidence-based practice to help health workers achieve a better understanding of Muslim beliefs about possession and how to work with patients that hold such beliefs. Evil Eye, Jinn Possession, and Mental Health Issues is an essential manual for mental health professionals, social workers and psychologists. It should also be of interest to academics and students in the healthcare sciences.

Humorous anecdotes, poignant encounters, and touching narratives breathe life into lessons on character, leaving a legacy, true greatness, personal integrity, and overcoming adversity.

In "Something Else to Smile About," Ziglar shares stories of: "the country lawyer who won case after case by understanding his opponent's point of view""mediocre college athlete's who became legends in the professional ranks""a Catholic sister whose "tough love" motivates teh chemically additced to take personal responsibility""countless individuals who've learned that failure is an event, not a person"

Whether you need a morning shot of ambition or a refreshing thought before a good night's sleep, "Something Else to Smile About "is a daily source of motivation and encouragement you'll turn to again and again and enthusiastically share with others.

Offers a comprehensive view of the emerging fields of secular-scientific mindfulness and Mindfulness-Based Teaching and Learning (MBTL) for professionals for use in a range of educational and clinical settings, including preK-12, higher education, adult and community education, social work, workplace education, medicine, psychology, and counselling. Provides intellectual depth, including addressing key critiques, while offering constructive support to practitioners and professionals in the full spectrum of skills and competencies required of secular-scientific mindfulness specialists, including an up-to-date competency framework. Presents a multi-disciplinary approach to secular-scientific mindfulness and its practices, with implications for teacher preparation and continuing education for a range of professions. These multi-disciplinary perspectives provide a fulsome view of mindfulness as it is unfolding in modern contexts, including the continuing dialogue with traditional Buddhist and classical Western philosophical sources; empirical perspectives from psychology and cognitive science, and practice-oriented scholarship from education, medicine, and social work.

"This special little book is one to own and keep. Quickly read it through then return again and again to slowly absorb the simple wisdom of the tales and be inspired by the stark soaring photographs of Tibet's landscape." - Cygnus Review Ten Tales from Tibet offers ten gentle, yet powerful, lessons exploring compassion, the very essence of Buddhism. A collection of poetic re-tellings distilled from ancient oral tradition, the stories have been specially chosen by Lama Lhakpa Yeshe because they demonstrate a beautiful wisdom in a simple, yet profound way, and teach us how to nurture the singular human quality that defines us all. Introduced by global peace and environment campaigner, Satish Kumar, a pupil of Lama Lhakpa Yeshe, and illustrated with photography by fellow Buddhist Matthieu Ricard, this is a beautifully crafted book and unique guide to opening our hearts and minds by cultivating compassion--helping others and ourselves--to find joy, peace, and happiness.

The transformations Buddhism has been undergoing in the modern age have inspired much research over the last decade. The main focus of attention has been the phenomenon known as Buddhist modernism, which is defined as a conscious attempt to adjust Buddhist teachings and practices in conformity with the modern norms of rationality, science, or gender equality. This book advances research on Buddhist modernism by attempting to clarify the highly diverse ways in which Buddhist faith, thought, and practice have developed in the modern age, both in Buddhist heartlands in Asia and in the West. It presents a collection of case studies that, taken together, demonstrate how Buddhist traditions interact with modern phenomena such as colonialism and militarism, the market economy, global interconnectedness, the institutionalization of gender equality, and recent historical events such as de-industrialization and the socio-cultural crisis in post-Soviet Buddhist areas. This volume shows how the (re)invention of traditions constitutes an important pathway in the development of Buddhist modernities and emphasizes the pluralistic diversity of these forms in different settings.

As the world becomes increasingly globalised Islam faces some important choices. Does it seek to "modernise" in line with the cultures in which it is practised, or does it retain its traditions even if they are at odds with the surrounding society? This book utilizes a critical rationalist viewpoint to illuminate many of the hotly contended issues in modern Islam, and to offer a fresh analysis. A variety of issues within Islam are discussed in this book including, Muslims and modernity; Islam, Christianity and Judaism; approaches to the understanding of the Quran; Muslim identity and civil society; doctrinal certainty and violent radicalism. In each case, the author makes use of Karl Popper's theory of critical rationalism to uncover new aspects of these issues and to challenge post-modern, relativist, literalist and justificationist readings of Islam. This is a unique perspective on contemporary Islam and as such will be of significant interest to scholars of Religious Studies, Islamic Studies and the Philosophy of Religion.

In Queer Companions Omar Kasmani theorizes saintly intimacy and the construction of queer social relations at Pakistan's most important site of Sufi pilgrimage. Conjoining queer theory and the anthropology of Islam, Kasmani outlines the felt and enfleshed ways in which saintly affections bind individuals, society, and the state in Pakistan through a public architecture of intimacy. Islamic saints become lovers and queer companions just as a religious universe is made valuable to critical and queer forms of thinking. Focusing on the lives of ascetics known as fakirs in Pakistan, Kasmani shows how the affective bonds with the place's patron saint, a thirteenth-century antinomian mystic, foster unstraight modes of living in the present. In a national context where religious shrines are entangled in the state's infrastructures of governance, coming close to saints further entails a drawing near to more-than-official histories and public forms of affect. Through various fakir life stories, Kasmani contends that this intimacy offers a form of queer world making with saints.

Massmarket edition of this spiritual guide to making the most of life, through bad times as well as good, from bestselling author Pema Choedroen. This accessible book has been on the US bestseller lists consistently for four years now. In The Wisdom of No Escape, bestselling author Pema Choedroen shows us the profound value of our situation of 'no exit' from the ups and downs of life. This book is about saying yes to life in all its manifestations - about making friends with ourselves and our world and embracing the potent mixture of joy, suffering, brilliance, and confusion that characterizes the human experience. It urges us to wake up wholeheartedly to everything and to use the abundant, richly textured fabric of everyday life as our primary spiritual teacher and guide.

Dionysian Buddhism: Guided Interpersonal Meditations in the Three Yanas will assist readers in exploring their own emotional landscapes. This sequence of thirty guided meditations by the renowned spiritual teacher and psychotherapist Claudio Naranjo is structured to guide individuals towards acceptance of what is and to be fully present -- to meet pain with joy, expand awareness into consciousness and to learn how to share in the full presence of others. The "Dionysian" context of Buddhism provides a lens in which to interpret non-attachment through noninterference with the stream of life. Naranjo draws on a wide range of Buddhist traditions, from Theravada to Vajrayana, in order to create a work that emphasizes both the experiential and multifaceted aspects of meditation. As Naranjo says, Only a change of consciousness might save our world, and that in view of this collective shift in consciousness there is nothing more relevant we can do than start with ourselves.

Move over dog lovers, "man" is getting inspurrrration from a new best friend-cats

God placed cats on earth with a special mission-to provide unconditional God-like love and support to their owners. In "Good Mews, " Kitty Chappell captures the playful and inquisitive characteristics we all love about the feline species, and she turns everyday occurrences into a practical life application. Her uplifting stories parallel real life circumstances in the overall scheme of God's view, ending with a scripture tie-in. It's a simple and fun approach to understanding ourselves and God a little better, and maybe even our cats, too Foreword by Martha Bolton, who's written comedy for performers such as Bob Hope, Phyllis Diller, and Mark Lowry. A great book for devotions
There are 35 million cat owners in the United States. Millions of these cat owners love their special pets enough to celebrate special days with them. More than 13 million cats receive birthday celebrations, and more than 37 million cats get Christmas gifts

This shining collection brings you inspiration and comfort in special chapters on marriage, motherhood, aging, bridging the generations, attitude, self-esteem and higher wisdom. Stories honor the strength and reveal the beauty of the feminine spirit. Included are incredible stories from Oprah Winfrey, Leo Buscaglia, Linda Ellerbee, Robert Fulghum, Kathie Lee Gifford and many others.

This book sets out how contemporary Iranian scholars have approached the Qur'an during recent decades. It particularly aims to explore the contributions of scholars that have emerged in the post 1979-revolution era, outlining their primary interpretive methods and foundational theories regarding the reading of the Qur'an. Examining issues such as the status of women, democracy, freedom of religion and human rights, this book analyses the theoretical contributions of several Iranian scholars, some of which are new to the English-speaking academy. The hermeneutical approaches of figures such Abdolkarim Soroush, Muhammad Mojtahed Shabestari, Mohsen Kadivar, Hasan Yousefi-Eshkevari, Abolqasem Fanaie and Mostafa Malekian are presented and then analysed to demonstrate how a contextualist approach to the Qu'ran has been formed in response to the influence of Western Orientalism. The effect of this approach to the Qu'ran is then shown to have wide-ranging effects on Iranian society. This study reveals Qu'ranic thought that has been largely overlooked by the West. It will, therefore. Be of great use to academics in Religious, Islamic and Qur'anic studies as well as those studying the culture of Iran and the Middle East more generally.

Gandhara is a name central to Buddhist heritage and iconography. It is the ancient name of a region in present-day Pakistan, bounded on the west by the Hindu Kush mountain range and to the north by the foothills of the Himalayas. 'Gandhara' is also the term given to this region's sculptural and architectural features between the first and sixth centuries CE. This book re-examines the archaeological material excavated in the region in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and traces the link between archaeological work, histories of museum collections and related interpretations by art historians. The essays in the volume underscore the diverse cultural traditions of Gandhara - from a variety of sources and perspectives on language, ethnicity and material culture (including classical accounts, Chinese writings, coins and Sanskrit epics) - as well as interrogate the grand narrative of Hellenism of which Gandhara has been a part. The book explores the making of collections of what came to be described as Gandhara art and reviews the Buddhist artistic tradition through notions of mobility and dynamic networks of transmission. Wide ranging and rigorous, this volume will appeal to scholars and researchers of early South Asian history, archaeology, religion (especially Buddhist studies), art history and museums.

The book evaluates on-going ethical conversations to learn how emotional communication is received, teachings are internalized, and a religious world-view is brought to life. Exploring how religious values saturate people's consciousness to induce subtle shifts in moral and ethical sensibilities, this book is about people's practices that illuminate how Islam is lived. Based on fieldwork conducted in Ankara between 2010 and 2016, the study enquires into people's ethical, religious, and moral motivations through the use of the ethnographic method and "thick description". Conversations and interviews with officials, community leaders, students, entrepreneurs, professionals, and blue-collar workers were subjected to close scrutiny to foreground societal change and churning. To capture perspectives absent or deliberately overlooked in mainstream public discourse and scholarship, fieldwork was conducted in locations ranging from homes, offices, and university dorms to the shrines of saints. In listening closely to how people talk about their religious practices, the book addresses the question of how Islamic subjectivities are being forged in Turkey. The study unveils how people are pushed to re-think old practices and attitudes in the process of reinterpreting Islam in light of contemporary concerns. Filling a gap in the literature where micro-level, grounded analyses of culture and society are relatively rare, this book is a key resource for readers interested in the anthropology of religion and gender, ethnography, Turkey, and the Middle East.

This volume makes a contribution to understanding pilgrimage, not as a transient activity at the margins of daily life, but as an event grounded firmly in the physical, symbolic and social experience of the everyday world. The vital relationship between pilgrimage and society is explored via a focus on a specific pilgrimage - the Kanwar pilgrimage of Bihar and Jharkhand in India and the southeast Terai of Nepal. The rising popularity of this old but relatively unknown pilgrimage is striking and reflects profound changes in caste, class and gender relation ships, subjectivity and notions of work in a modern economy. Through the lens of pilgrimage and pilgrims, the book explores the everyday context of life in parts of rural Bihar and southeast Nepal, questions about agency and desire in Hinduism, and the meaning given to symbolic life in a changing world. This requires an integrative approach looking beyond the performance of the pilgrimage to the historical, economic and social-cultural context. The volume underscores the role of popular and local history in understanding the life and popularity of a complex phenomenon, such as the pilgrimage today. Equal importance is given to the geography and climatic conditions, for natural rhythms such as that of rains, rivers, planetary movements, were and still are, intimately entwined with the agricultural, socio-economic and ritual cycles. The particular experience of the world that this engenders and its relationship to the pilgrimage is described through the active voice of the pilgrims and descriptions of rites, some new and many fast disappearing. Please note: Taylor & Francis does not sell or distribute the Hardback in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka

Carl Trueman traces the historical roots of many hot-button issues such as transgenderism and homosexuality, offering thoughtful biblical analysis as he uncovers the profound impact of the sexual revolution on modern human identity.

Empleando cuarenta dias de historias de la vida real acerca de milagrosas e inspiradoras respuestas a la oracion, Mark Batterson usa los principios contenidos en su best seller El hacedor de circulos para ensenarles a los lectores una nueva manera de orar. Despues de que sus lectores pronto crecieran de miles a diez miles, historias milagrosas e inspiradoras de respuestas a oraciones empezaron a salir a la luz, y asi como se compartian esas historias, otros se inspiraban en su fe para orar aun con mas valentia. Estas historias inspiradas, retaran tanto a hombres como a mujeres a orar y seguir orando como nunca antes al cabo de cuarenta dias. Una vez que hayan pasado los cuarenta dias, habran establecido un fuerte habito de oracion, y habran dado comienzo a toda una vida dedicada a ver obrar a Dios y creer en ese Dios que es capaz de hacer todas las cosas. En Dibuja el circulo_Devocional, los lectores descubriran el poder que tienen la oracion audaz, y una fe mas audaz aun en las promesas de Dios."

This book examines the importance of the topic of 'feeling tone' (vedana) as it appears in early Buddhist texts and practice, and also within contemporary, secular, mindfulness-based interventions. The volume aims to highlight the crucial nature of the 'feeling tone' or 'taste of experience' in determining mental reactivity, behaviour, character, and ethics. In the history of Buddhism, and in its reception in contemporary discourse, vedana has often been a much-neglected topic, with greater emphasis being accorded to other meditational focuses, such as body and mind. However, 'feeling tone' (vedana) can be seen as a crucial pivotal point in understanding the cognitive process, both in contemporary mindfulness and meditation practice within more traditional forms of Buddhism. The taste of experience, it is claimed, comes as pleasant, unpleasant, and neither pleasant nor unpleasant - and these 'tones' or 'tastes' inevitably follow from humans being embodied sensory beings. That experience comes in this way is unavoidable, but what follows can be seen in terms of reactivity or responsiveness. This book was originally published as a special issue of Contemporary Buddhism.

It has been argued that the mystical Sufi form of Islam is the most sensitive to other cultures, being accommodative to other traditions and generally tolerant to peoples of other faiths. It readily becomes integrated into local cultures and they are similarly often infused into Sufism. Examples of this reciprocity are commonly reflected in Sufi poetry, music, hagiographic genres, memoires, and in the ritualistic practices of Sufi traditions. This volume shows how this often-side-lined tradition functions in the societies in which it is found, and demonstrates how it relates to mainstream Islam. The focus of this book ranges from reflecting Sufi themes in the Qur'anic calligraphy to movies, from ideals to everyday practices, from legends to actual history, from gender segregation to gender transgression, and from legalism to spiritualism. Consequently, the international panel of contributors to this volume are trained in a range of disciplines that include religious studies, history, comparative literature, anthropology, and ethnography. Covering Southeast Asia to West Africa as well as South Asia and the West, they address both historical and contemporary issues, shedding light on Sufism's adaptability. This book sets aside conventional methods of understanding Islam, such as theological, juridical, and philosophical, in favour of analysing its cultural impact. As such, it will be of great interest to all scholars of Islamic Studies, the Sociology of Religion, Religion and Media, as well as Religious Studies and Area Studies more generally.

Investigating the appeal of the group Hizb ut-Tahrir (HT), the study expands on why non-violent radical forms of Islam still attract segments of Muslim communities in the West. Being one of the few comprehensive studies on HT, this book discusses how this Islamist group advocate for the caliphate and for the implementation of shari'a but also reject violence as a tool to achieve these goals. Through interviews with current HT members, observation at HT-sponsored events and social media analysis, this book leads the reader into the world of vocal radical Islamist groups, exploring their goals and activities in Western states, with a special focus on the UK and Australia. In fact, as many other non-violent Islamist groups, HT represent the choice of all those individuals who might share Islamist arguments but who reject the use of violence. Given their non-violent nature, vocal radicals are mostly free to operate in the Western world, attracting new members, conducting a relentless campaign against the "West as a system" and representing a serious source of concern not only for national authorities but for the broader Muslim community. This book stands as an original publication and paves the way to a new area of study crossing sociology, Islamic studies and political sciences. This book is one of the few contributions on vocal and radical Islamism to date.