Parabola, Spring 2013: Spirit in the World Issue

Parabola: Spirit in the World (Spring 2013)

Parabola, Volume 38, Number 1 (Spring 2013). This issue takes up spirit in the world — the meeting of the sacred and the everyday, and the many ways awareness is carried into ordinary life. It gathers essays, conversations, and poems from teachers and writers across traditions. The full issue is available to read below as a free download. Contributors include Ram Dass, Gary Snyder, Tara Brach, Bhikkhu Bodhi, and Gerard Manley Hopkins — voices from across contemplative traditions on the meeting of the sacred and ordinary life.

Features

Bridging the Spiritual and the Mundane — Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi. A journey toward a new understanding of how the sacred lives in daily experience. (p. 8)

A Consonance of Feeling — Lee van Laer, with art by Chantal Heinegg. On painting icons in a modern world. (p. 16)

No Ideas But in Things — Joshua Boettiger. An exploration of embodiment and the life of the spirit in material form. (p. 22)

Grace Is Here! — David Ulrich and Laura Dunn. A conversation with the spiritual teacher Ram Dass. (p. 28)

The Real Johnny Appleseed — Ray Silverman. The man behind the legend planted far more than trees. (p. 36)

Breathing Out: Offering Our Care — Tara Brach. On transforming suffering through attention and compassion. (p. 42)

Ethel Merston and G.I. Gurdjieff — Mary Ellen Korman. An Englishwoman's encounter with the Fourth Way master. (p. 48)

Shodo: The Way of the Brush — Carol Ring, with art by Kazuo Ishii. Beauty and wisdom on the path of calligraphy and ink painting. (p. 56)

A New Sense of Responsibility — Roger Lipsey. On the enduring significance of Václav Havel. (p. 64)

To Try to Have Some Healing — Richard Whittaker. A conversation with the filmmaker Silas Hagerty. (p. 72)

Smokey the Bear Sutra — Gary Snyder. Hail the American Buddha. (p. 80)

Wild Pilgrimage — Geneen Marie Haugen. On paying attention to the sacred earth. (p. 88)

Sri Ramakrishna at the Temple of Dakshineswar — Edited by Swami Abhedananda. A visit with the "Divine Man." (p. 96)

Do You Believe? — J.M. Barrie. A passage in which Tinker Bell's life hangs in the balance. (p. 102)

Poems

Pied Beauty — Gerard Manley Hopkins. (p. 54)

God's Grandeur — Gerard Manley Hopkins. (p. 99)

Epicycle

Opening the Gates — Anonymous, Hasidic; adapted by Diane Wolkstein from Shlomo Carlebach's telling. (p. 86)

Book Reviews

The Better Angels of Our Nature by Steven Pinker — reviewed by Felix Dux. (p. 106)

When God Talks Back by T.M. Luhrmann — reviewed by Bill Williams. (p. 116)

Prayer of the Heart in Christian and Sufi Mysticism by Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee — reviewed by John H. Whittaker. (p. 119)

Endpoint (p. 128)