Do you question the beliefs of the religion in which you were raised?Are you "spiritual but not religious?"Are you investigating the role of religion and spirituality in your life?If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, then you are a "Seeker," and this book is designed to help you find your way.Faith without Labels: a Guide to Eclectic Spirituality is a self-help book and workbook designed to introduce Seekers to eclectic spirituality, "A highly individualized spiritual belief system composed of selected elements drawn from various doctrines," and to provide clear instructions on how to customize and follow this path. Faith without Labels: a Guide to Eclectic Spirituality is the fruit of a lifetime of spiritual inquiry, study and practice. From mainstream Christianity to past-life memories, the occult, Wicca and Buddhism, the author's intimate opening spiritual memoir makes for compelling reading and encourages readers to examine their own beliefs. Then Faith without Labels: a Guide to Eclectic Spirituality gives them the means to do that through a comprehensive workbook designed to help them analyze what they believe, what works for them and what doesn't, identify gaps and, finally, create a roadmap to their own authentic eclectic spiritual path.Faith without Labels: a Guide to Eclectic Spirituality is geared towards Seekers who may currently identify as "spiritual but not religious" (SBNR) as well as adults who are investigating spirituality in earnest for the first time. In a 2012 survey conducted by the Pew Religion and Public Life Project, 7% of Americans said that they were spiritual but not religious. And, according to the same research, "... nearly one-in-five adults under age 30 (18%) say they were raised in a religion but are now unaffiliated with any particular faith." Since eclectic spirituality has no established doctrine, Faith without Labels: a Guide to Eclectic Spirituality will appeal both to SBNRs who reject organized religion and to adults who are seeking a spiritual practice that meets their unique needs.

Spirituality.The search for happiness --Religion, East and West --Mindfulness --The truth of suffering --Enlightenment --The mystery of consciousness.The mind divided --Structure and function --Are our minds already split? --Conscious and unconscious processing in the brain --Consciousness is what matters --The riddle of the self.What are we calling "I"? --Consciousness without self --Lost in thought --The challenge of studying the self --Penetrating the illusion --Meditation.Gradual versus sudden realization --Dzogchen: taking the goal as the path --Having no head --The paradox of acceptance --Gurus, death, drugs, and other puzzles.Mind on the brink of death --The spiritual uses of pharmacology.

Jesus’ spiritual practices examied for today's believers to follow

The inspirational wisdom Oprah Winfrey shares in her monthly O., The Oprah Magazine column updated, curated, and collected for the first time in a beautiful keepsake book. As a creative force, student of the human heart and soul, and champion of living the life you want, Oprah Winfrey stands alone. Over the years, she has made history with a legendary talk show - the highest-rated program of its kind, launched her own television network, become the nation's only African-American billionaire, and been awarded both an honorary degree by Harvard University and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. From all her experiences, she has gleaned life lessons—which, for fourteen years, she's shared in O, The Oprah Magazine's widely popular "What I Know For Sure" column, a monthly source of inspiration and revelation. Now, for the first time, these thoughtful gems have been revised, updated, and collected in What I Know For Sure, a beautiful cloth bound book with a ribbon marker, packed with insight and revelation from Oprah Winfrey. Organized by theme—joy, resilience, connection, gratitude, possibility, awe, clarity, and power—these essays offer a rare, powerful and intimate glimpse into the heart and mind of one of the world's most extraordinary women—while providing readers a guide to becoming their best selves. Candid, moving, exhilarating, uplifting, and frequently humorous, the words Oprah shares in What I Know For Sure shimmer with the sort of truth that readers will turn to again and again.

This book lays out the basic characteristics of liberal theology, delving into historical and philosophical sources as well as social and intellectual roots. Ideal for readers who want a better understanding of liberal theology, a religious tradition that is rooted not in authority but in one's own experience and conscience.

Life is a constant search for meaning, and reflective minds need to find deeper and more comprehensive meaning than that normally proffered by the orthodox teaching of any creedal religion. When this book was initially published in 1964, religion had begun to recognize the importance of psychology and psychology had considered a spiritual principle in man. Miss Isherwood’s purpose in writing this book is to relate science and religion more closely. Her theme is that the evolution of consciousness from protozoa provides a link which not only gives grounds for faith in life and an inspiration for carrying development forward, but which reveals that, as we continuously work at deepening our insight into the realms of spirit, the life process appears to us as steadily more meaningful. Her engaging writing style makes this a fascinating glimpse at a philosophy of religion starting to engage with science.

From the author of The Architecture of Happiness, a deeply moving meditation on how we can still benefit, without believing, from the wisdom, the beauty, and the consolatory power that religion has to offer. Alain de Botton was brought up in a committedly atheistic household, and though he was powerfully swayed by his parents' views, he underwent, in his mid-twenties, a crisis of faithlessness. His feelings of doubt about atheism had their origins in listening to Bach's cantatas, were further developed in the presence of certain Bellini Madonnas, and became overwhelming with an introduction to Zen architecture. However, it was not until his father's death -- buried under a Hebrew headstone in a Jewish cemetery because he had intriguingly omitted to make more secular arrangements -- that Alain began to face the full degree of his ambivalence regarding the views of religion that he had dutifully accepted. Why are we presented with the curious choice between either committing to peculiar concepts about immaterial deities or letting go entirely of a host of consoling, subtle and effective rituals and practices for which there is no equivalent in secular society? Why do we bristle at the mention of the word "morality"? Flee from the idea that art should be uplifting, or have an ethical purpose? Why don't we build temples? What mechanisms do we have for expressing gratitude? The challenge that de Botton addresses in his book: how to separate ideas and practices from the religious institutions that have laid claim to them. In Religion for Atheists is an argument to free our soul-related needs from the particular influence of religions, even if it is, paradoxically, the study of religion that will allow us to rediscover and rearticulate those needs.

The phrase "I'm spiritual but not religious" has become a cliché. It's easy to find God amid the convenience of self-styled spirituality -- but is it possible (and more worthwhile) to search for God through religion? Minister and celebrated author Lillian Daniel gives a new spin on church with stories of what a life of faith can really be: weird, wondrous, and well worth trying. From a rock-and-roller sexton to a BB gun-toting grandma, a church service attended by animals to a group of unlikely theologians at Sing Sing, Daniel shows us a portrait of church that is flawed, fallible -- and deeply faithful. With poignant reflections and sly wit, Daniel invites all of us to step out of ourselves, dare to become a community, and encounter a God greater than we could ever invent. Humorous and sincere, this is a book about people finding God in the most unexpected of places: prisons, airports, yoga classes, committee meetings, and, strangest of all, right there in church.

A practical and sensitive exploration of the Bible's teaching on homosexuality. A practical and sensitive exploration of the Bible's teaching on homosexuality. It's the hot topic of the moment. Christians, the church and the Bible seem to be out of step with modern attitudes towards homosexuality. And there is growing hostility towards those who hold a different view to the culture's. So is God homophobic? And how do we relate to both Christians and non-Christians who experience same-sex attraction? In this short, simple book, Sam Allberry wants to help confused Christians understand what God has said about these questions in the scriptures. Drawing on his own experience, he offers a positive and liberating way forward through the debate. This revised and updated version includes answers to some new questions, including: * Should Christians attend gay weddings? * Isn't the Christian view of sexuality dangerous and harmful? * Is it sinful to experience same-sex attraction?

We live in a time of high Church membership, but low Church attendance. Franco Ferrarotti, arguably the most important sociologist of religion alive, captures the source of this paradox In the title of his new book, Faith without Dogma. For it is belief that propels membership, while the absence of dogma results in a reticence to accept hierarchical direction from above or beyond. Basing much of his analysis on the postwar struggles within Roman Catholicism, Ferrarotti views the demand for religious renewal and revival as part and parcel of the emergence of broad social agendas—agendas to which not even the Roman curia could remain impervious. The former easy relationships between Church and State, especially authoritarian states in Europe and Latin America, gave way to a critical defense of individual rights within a context of a broadened vision of Christian doctrine. In addition to issues Involved in internal affairs of religion, Ferrarotti explores a series of developments that have changed for all time the nature of Church survival. The critical element, one that goes beyond specific doctrinal accommodations, is the new primary connection of Church to people rather than Church to State. This came about through the widespread acceptance of science and technology as frames of intellectual reference, the emergence of secularization as mediating religious claims and the creation from the Enlightenment to the Postmodern eras of "civil religions." The volume concludes with a set of chapters on the nature of sacred events and objects, the emergence of new varieties of prayer, and concludes with a chapter on the relationship of ideology to theology prepared especially for the English language edition of Faith without Dogma. This is a book likely to attract a broad audience among religionists and culturologists, as well as social scientists.