Humans are intrinsically religious. Religions are intrinsically human; we make them in our own image, after our own likeness, often to conjure divine sanction for what we know is evil. Religion isn’t evil, but it is dangerous. When lived as mythos rather than logos, religion offers paths to self-transcendence rooted in compassion. When lived as logos rather than mythos, self-transcendence is blocked, and religion breeds fanaticism, self—obsession, xenophobia, arrogance, and violence. We live in an age of fanatics and fantasies where religions rooted in jealous gods are hijacked by even more jealous demagogues, and the pious are imprisoned in a fog of self-serving lies. My passion is to lift the fog and free others and myself for self-transcendence. My method involves the Neti Neti (Sanskrit for “Not this, Not that”) Manifesto.
For the past few years I have used the Neti Neti Manifesto to foster conversations across...
