A year ago I wrote about five religious trends to watch for in 2009. I suggested what will happen to the religious right, the religious left, religion-based terrorism, Eastern spirituality and all those people who like to say they’re spiritual but not religious.
With the dawn of our new decade, I’m coming to the conclusion the five trends have real staying power, which could see them sticking with us to 2020 and beyond. Here are the five religious and spiritual shifts I predicted, plus my analysis of what’s happened in the past year or more to indicate they could be long-lasting….
[blockquote] Secular spirituality will strengthen. The populist mantra taking us into the next decade is: “I’m not religious, but I’m spiritual.” It’s commonplace for people now to oppose religious organizations, while embracing a host of spiritual practices and beliefs. This “secular spirituality” manifests itself in mainstream publishing, widespread nature reverence and pop culture figures such as Oprah, Eckhart Tolle and Deepak Chopra.[/blockquote]
It’s time for KJS to appear on Oprah. TEC is close to the “spirituality” of Oprah and Oprah is a priestess with immense power and influence. Many women I know are using up the hard drive memory on DVR with High Definition Oprah. She is a personality which has reached the level of cult like dedication from her many followers. My main gripe is her veiled denigration of men with her endless stories of the mistreatment of women by men.
The commentary is wishful thinking, not to be taken seriously. For example: [i]”Islamic anger is based largely on a sense that brothers and sisters in the faith are being vilified and oppressed by Western financial, political and military powers.”[/i] Oh really? Quite the opposite, no? The west has collectively been bending over backward, or the the case of Mr. Obama bowing deeply forward, in an attempt to coddle, placate, appease, mollify, and satisfy Muslims. It has not worked.
Dealing with terrorism, Todd says, requires [i]”multilateralism, interfaith dialogue and negotiation”[/i] as well as [i]”psychological and spiritual counselling to thousands of jailed suspected terrorists to counter their militant ideology.”[/i] Does he mean the two Gitmo art therapy graduates who returned to Yemen to organize the recent airliner attack?
Todd writes for a very left-wing paper in Vancouver, Canada’s most left-wing city, which routinely sends several avowed Socialists to the national Parliament in Ottawa. He is a superb example of the deeply-flawed assumption of liberalism that people are fundamentally good — conservatives excepted, of course — and do bad things only because of social disadvantage, lack of understanding, poor self-esteem, or the absence of a sufficiently generous government program.
Are these “predictions” or heartfelt leftist/progressive wishful thinking?
“If I wish hard enough, it WILL come true!”
Rather vague predictions in my opinion. Almost all of them along the lines of “things will continue as they were, only escalate.”
The author catches fire when he gets to deal with the folks he dislikes — the “religious right.” It’s their that his enthusiasm yields incoherence and illogic, because he essentially has decided that “conservatives” = “religious right.” It’s that blurring of categories that yields the incoherence.
Just to name a few examples:
RE: The religious right has been hit with some body blows — particularly with the rise of Obama, the failure of the war they backed in Iraq and the defeat of Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin (right).”
It’s not only the “religious right” that counts the rise of Obama as a “body blow” — it’s conservatives in general. Further, I never thought of Palin as a member of the “religious right” [other than that she is religious]. She’s merely a conservative populist.
RE: “In addition, more U.S. states have recently been legalizing same-sex unions.”
Huge bias showing here — the same-gender sexual relations crowd has been dealt some massive and unexpected defeats. It’s been a positively fabulous year for the “religious right” on that issue.
RE: “Even though Palin is an embarrassment to many women . . . ”
Um — correction. “Even though Palin is an embarrassment to [liberal] women . . .”
RE: “The religious right was reinvigorated by last year’s no-holds-barred crusade against Democrats’ attempts to bring in universal health insurance.”
Correction. It was *conservatives in general* who fought the health care “reform” [sic] actions of the Democrats.
RE: “They called Obama a “socialist” and likened him to Adolf Hitler.”
No no — *conservatives* called him that. Not merely the “religious right.”
The conflation throughout that little part between conservatives and “religious right” was simply astounding. I expect it merely demonstrates a vast ignorance of the conservatives in the US, which is understandable, given the man’s foundational worldview.