“Using New Eyes”: Photography as a Spiritual Practice for Faith Formation and Worship

This article presents three cases of how Lutheran groups used photography as a spiritual practice in processes that led to group spiritual reflection for faith formation and worship: a photography club; a Photography as a Spiritual Practice mini‐course in a parish; and a six‐month parish project of communal art‐making of liturgical media art for one church's Easter Vigil readings.     

Richard Wagner and the Birth of The Birth of Tragedy 1

Abstract

Nietzsche writes that the ‘real task’ of The Birth of Tragedy is to ‘solve the puzzle of Wagner’s relation to Greek tragedy’. The ‘puzzle’, I suggest, is the intermingling in his art and writings of earlier socialist optimism with later Schopenhauerian pessimism. According to the former the function of the ‘rebirth of Greek tragedy’ in the ‘collective artwork’ is to ‘collect’, and so create, community. According to the second the function of the artwork is to intimate a realm ‘beyond’ this world of pain and death. The audacity of The Birth is that it attempts to show that Wagner can have his cake and eat it: the ‘Dionysian’, musical, element provides a ‘metaphysical comfort’, while the ‘Apollonian’, verbal, element draws a ‘veil of oblivion’ over the metaphysical, thereby allowing the artwork to solidify community. Contrary to the standard Anglophone view, this perspective on The Birth shows that Nietzsche’s intimate association with Wagner during the period of its creation lies at the heart of its philosophical content.     

Religion and positive well-being among Israeli and diaspora Jews: Findings from the World Values Survey

This study investigates the impact of selected religious indicators on two measures of positive well-being among Jews. Using data from subsamples of Jewish respondents from Israel (N?=?1,023) and the diaspora (N?=?859) taken from the World Values Survey, single-item measures of happiness and life satisfaction were regressed onto six measures of religiousness in the diaspora sample and onto the one religious measure available in the Israeli sample, adjusting for effects of age, gender, marital status, education, employment, and social class. Among Israeli Jews, affirming the importance of God in one's life is modestly associated with greater life satisfaction (β?=?0.07, p?<?0.05), but not with happiness. In the diaspora, the same measure is associated with greater happiness (β?=?0.13, p?<?0.01), as is more frequent attendance at synagogue services (β?=?0.14, p?<?0.01), but neither is associated with life satisfaction.     

How do Jewish teachings relate to beliefs about depression in the strictly orthodox Jewish community?

The aim of this study was to explore whether and, if so, how Jewish teachings influence strictly orthodox Jewish beliefs about depression. The rabbinic literature was searched for Jewish teachings relevant to depression. Ten consenting strictly orthodox Jews were purposively selected and interviewed using a semi-structured interview schedule focussing on their beliefs about causes of and treatments for depression. Thematic analysis was used to analyse transcribed interviews and explore relationships between community beliefs and the Jewish teachings identified in the review. The key themes in both the rabbinic literature and the community included the overriding importance in Judaism of preserving life, using appropriate, acceptable means to do so, and obligations to help others. Contrasts between rabbinic teachings and community beliefs included community concerns about stigma, generally lacking in the rabbinic literature, and greater rabbinic emphasis on spiritual exertion in dealing with depression. Findings could prove useful to those managing depressed, orthodox Jews.     

Learning the Church: ecclesiological thought and ecclesial practice

This article illustrates how the ecclesiological ideas developed by Professor Daniel Hardy (1930–2007) have been received and used in the life of the Church of England's Diocese of Coventry. It highlights the importance of theological engagement for those in a position of oversight and leadership in the Church, and goes on to connect Hardy's language of intensity and extensity with the story, structure and ethos of Coventry Cathedral in general, and with the iconic Stalingrad Madonna in particular, illustrating the rich synthesis that can be achieved between systematic ecclesiology and the central ethos of a church. The article goes on to argue that certain practices in the Church of England in general, and Coventry Diocese in particular, resonate well with Hardy's idea of ‘socio-poiesis’. These include the nurture of virtuous ecclesial practice and use of measurement in parish life (notably through ‘Natural Church Development)’, the new form taken by ecumenism in British cities and the role of the Bishop within it, as well as the embeddedness of the Church of England in many of the nation's schools. In relating Hardy's key themes to these concrete practices, this article challenges the stale division between Church and Academy, advocating fruitful and animating dialogue between the two as the best response to the challenges faced by each today.     

Solving Wollheim's Dilemma: A Fix for the Institutional Definition of Art

Richard Wollheim threatened George Dickie's institutional definition of art with a dilemma which entailed that the theory is either redundant or incomprehensible and useless. This article modifies the definition to avoid such criticism. First, it shows that the definition's concept of the artworld is not vague when understood as a conventional system of beliefs and practices. Then, based on Gaut's cluster theory, it provides an account of reasons artworld members have to confer the status of a candidate for appreciation. An authorised member of an artworld has a good reason to confer the status on an object if it satisfies a subset of criteria respected as sufficient within this artworld. The first horn of the dilemma is averted because explaining the reasons behind conferral cannot eliminate references to the institution, and the second loses its sharpness, as accepting partial arbitrariness of the conferral does not deprive the theory of its explanatory power.     

Necessity of origins and multi-origin art

The Necessity of Origins is the thesis that, necessarily, if a material object wholly originates from some particular material, then it could not have wholly originated from any significantly non-overlapping material. Several philosophers have argued for this thesis using as a premise a principle that we call ‘Single Origin Necessity’. However, we argue that Single Origin Necessity is false. So any arguments for The Necessity of Origins that rely on Single Origin Necessity are unsound. We also argue that the Necessity of Origins itself is false. Our arguments rely on a thesis in the ontology of art that we find plausible: Multi-Work Materialism. It is the thesis that works of art that have multiple concrete manifestations are co-located with those manifestations.     

Factors Influencing Uptake of Genetic Testing For Colorectal Cancer Risk in an Australian Jewish Population

There is a significant excess of colorectal cancer in the Australian Ashkenazi Jewish community. This excess can partially be attributed to inherited factors that are over represented in this population, such as the APC variant I1307K, which is associated with a modest increase in colorectal cancer risk. There is currently only sporadic clinical genetic testing offered for this variant, as neither the exact increase in cancer risk and therefore the appropriate screening strategies for I1307K carriers, nor the acceptability of such testing in Jewish communities have been determined. This study reports a high acceptability of such genetic testing within a community sample of 300 Australian Jewish individuals—94% of participants would have a test for predisposition to colorectal cancer and a majority would make this decision based on the desire for information for their families and to decrease their own cancer risk. Some concerns were noted about genetic testing for cancer predisposition, including insurance discrimination, test accuracy and confidentiality.     

The Creative Dilemma: The Influence of Schiller''s Aesthetics on the Life and Work of Otto Rank

The impact of philosophical wisdom on the pioneers of psychoanalytic work is presented in this article, in particular the influence of Schiller's aesthetics on the theoretical and clinical work of Otto Rank. The essay will compare and contrast Schiller's major themes—in particular his notions of the aesthetic impulse, will, and his concept of harmonia—with aspects of Rank's contributions, namely, his notions of creativity and the art of living. Drawing from Schiller's aesthetic vision, Rank's notion that art and play are foundational sources for healing is described in the author's own clinical work.     

An evaluation of the effects of supplemental “fluency” training during maintenance

The voice onset time (VOT) of two groups of treated stutterers and a normal-speaking group was assessed by spectrographic analysis. Both groups of stutterers had significantly slower VOT than the normal speakers. The experimental group of stutterers was given 8 wk of “fluency” training designed to remediate characteristics of speech identified as related to “tenuous” fluency. The control group of stutterers received ongoing maintenance therapy. Posttreatment VOT was assessed. The experimental stuttering group had significantly decreased their VOT in the direction of the normal-speaking group, whereas the control group of stutterers had a greater VOT between pre- and posttreatment. The implication of these results for the maintenance of fluency are discussed.