The Sicilian Feast of the Dead
A short, informative presentation on the Festa dei Morti traditions of Sicily.
History
“Radical Mindfulness: Why Transforming Fear of Death is Politically Vital”
Dr. Rowe’s book is available from Amazon and other retailers. Here’s the blurb: Collecting insights from powerful thinkers across multiple traditions―including Black radicals, Indigenous resurgence theorists, terror management theorists, and Buddhist feminists― Rowe argues for the political importance of seemingly apolitical practices such as meditation and ritual. On their own, these strategies are not enough, … Read more“Radical Mindfulness: Why Transforming Fear of Death is Politically Vital”
“No-one built these for 5,000 years… until now”
YouTube documentarian Tom Scott presents this item on the revival of long barrows; Neolithic constructions that might have been churches, graveyards or landmarks, but which are now used as commercial columbaria and as ritual spaces. More at The Soulton Long Barrow and via the Sacred Stones website.
“The Euthanasia Ritual Kept Secret From The Catholic Church in Italy”
A fascinating documentary on the folklore of the Accabadora (’Lady of Kind Death’) in Sardinia, Italy, where – according to rumor – there existed a tradition of compassionate euthanasia carried out by a special class of women.
Alan Moore’s “Grandeur & Monstrosity”
Any readers intrigued by the mostly inchoate phenomenon that I optimistically refer to as Poetic Faith – the notion and practice of creating one’s own religion, as a work of art – should track down Alan Moore’s story Grandeur & Monstrosity, which appears in the graphic narrative anthology “God is Dead: the Book of Acts; … Read moreAlan Moore’s “Grandeur & Monstrosity”
“On ‘Choosing Suicide’: Documentary as Confrontation”
In the following article, originally published in the Summer 1980 edition of Television Quarterly, documentarian Richard Ellison describes the production of his highly controversial special “Choosing Suicide”. The documentary was produced at the request of its subject, Brooklyn-based artist and psychotherapist Jo Roman, who had decided to end her own life after receiving a terminal … Read more“On ‘Choosing Suicide’: Documentary as Confrontation”
“Myths of Death” podcast
Historian Torri Yates-Orr and mythologist John Bucher of the Skeleton Keys podcast discuss the mythology of death, as well as Thanatos, Hel, Gede, the Grim Reaper, and the afterlife.
An Online Symposium Celebrating 50 Years of “The Denial of Death”, With Caitlin Doughty & Sheldon Solomon
I’m looking forward to attending this upcoming online symposium, celebrating the 50th anniversary of Ernest Becker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book The Denial of Death. Published in 1973, the book helped spark the Happy Death Movement, a clear precursor to the current Death Positivity Movement. The event will be moderated by D.S. Moss and will feature speakers … Read moreAn Online Symposium Celebrating 50 Years of “The Denial of Death”, With Caitlin Doughty & Sheldon Solomon
“One life: imagining a radical acceptance of death”
My new article for OnlySky explores the philosophy of radical death acceptance via the nontheistic religion of Cavesword imagined in Gore Vidal’s 1954 novel Messiah, tracing the concept back to the garden-school of Epicurus and then to the bohemian counter-culture surrounding the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam: The humanist point of view is centered on the … Read more“One life: imagining a radical acceptance of death”
Simon Critchley on Religion and Death
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