Spirit Matters

Carl Siciliano is a nationally recognized advocate and provider for homeless LGBTQ youth. In 2002, he founded the Ali Forney Center (AFC) in New York City. AFC has grown to become the nation’s largest and most comprehensive housing program for homeless LGBTQ youth.

His work has been featured by NPR, CNN, The Daily Show, and New York magazine. Now he’s told his compelling story in a new book, Making Room: Three Decades of Fighting for Beds, Belonging, and a Safe Place for LGBTQ Youth. We spoke about his own coming out, his relationship with the Catholic Church, his spiritual transformation, the value of engaging in service work, and his moving experiences over many years of advocacy for a disadvantaged population. 

Find out more about Carl Siciliano and The Ali Forney Center



A special episode on the growing discipline of yoga therapy and scientific research on the benefits of yoga practices. Two guests this time. Catherine Justice is an integrative physical therapist, certified yoga therapist, and the program manager for the Division of Integrative Medicine at Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis. The associate editor of the International Journal of Yoga Therapy, she has conducted research on yoga for arthritis, Parkinson’s disease, and lower-back pain.

Sat Bir Khalsa has been engaged in research on the effects of yoga and meditation practices on physical and psychological health since 2001. He’s conducted clinical research on a number of disorders, including insomnia, PTSD, and anxiety, and his numerous affiliations include: certified instructor of Kundalini Yoga; director of research for the Kundalini Research Institute; research associate at the Benson Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine; research affiliate of the Osher Center for Integrative Medicine, and associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. He is editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Yoga Therapy and chair of the scientific program committee for the International Association of Yoga Therapists' annual symposium on yoga research.  

Catherine Justice The Art of Well Being

Sat Bir Khalsa

International Association of Yoga Therapists

Connect with Philip Goldberg Author, Speaker, Spiritual Counselor, Writing Coach

Henry Shukman is a poet, author, and Zen master in the Sanbo Zen lineage. Born in the UK, where his parents taught at Oxford, he now resides in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he’s spiritual director emeritus of the Mountain Cloud Zen Center. He teaches various forms of mindfulness meditation and is the creator of a meditation app called The Way. He tells his personal story in a memoir titled One Blade of Grass, and he’s the author of a new book, Original Love: The Four Inns on the Path of Awakening. We spoke of his spiritual origins, the different forms Zen teaching has taken on, the nuances of mindfulness and meditation, and especially his new book and what he means by "original love." 

Marie Grace B. is a cofounder of, and spokesperson for, Spiritual Emergence Anonymous (SEA). SEA describes itself as "a grassroots world-wide 12-step program for spiritual emergence." The program's purpose is "to support spiritual emergence in individuals whose spiritual transformation is so powerful that they desire assistance and support from a group in integrating their spiritual experience by seeking stability, clarity, and being of greater service in the world." Because SEA is modeled on the 12-step ethic, anonymity is a central principle, which is why Marie Grace, when representing SEA, does not use her last name or state her professional training and background. We spoke about the origins of SEA and the value it has in the lives of participants.  

https://spiritualemergenceanonymous.org/ 



We welcome two returning champions to Spirit Matters. James Finley is a clinical psychologist, a spiritual director and a faculty member at the Center for Action and Contemplation. Early in his life he was a monk in a Trappist monastery and a novice under the well-known mystic Thomas Merton. He is a recognized authority on contemplative Christianity and mysticism whose books include Merton’s Palace of Nowhere, The Contemplative Heart, Christian Meditation, and The Healing Path.

Mirabai Starr is an award-winning author of creative non-fiction and contemporary translations of sacred literature. She teaches and speaks in various venues on contemplative practice, mysticism, and inter-spiritual dialog. Her earlier books taught readers about the great Christian mystics (John of the Cross, Julian of Norwich, Teresa of Avila). Her more recent books include Wild Mercy: Living the Fierce and Tender Wisdom of the Women Mystics, Caravan of No Despair: A Memoir of Loss and Transformation, and her latest, Ordinary Mysticism: Your Life as Sacred Ground. 

They are on the show together because they are teaching a workshop together this fall (November, 2024) under the auspices of Gladdening Light, in which they will draw upon the teachings of Christian and Non-Christian mystical traditions to offer "practical guidelines in the gentle art of contemplative practice."  

James Finley

Gladdening Light.org

Find our more about Philip Goldberg Author, Speaker, Spiritual Counselor, Writing Coach

Francis X. Clooney is the Parkman Professor of Divinity and professor of Comparative Theology at Harvard Divinity School. Prior to that, he taught at Boston College and was the director of Harvard's Center for the Study of World Religions. He is a renowned scholar of Hinduism and at the same time, a Catholic theologian and an ordained Jesuit priest for more than half a century. He is also a leading figure in the developing field of Comparative Theology, which involves studying traditions other than one’s own.

Dr. Clooney is a prolific author whose books reflect a deep interest in interfaith enquiry. They include: Theology After Vedanta: An Experiment in Comparative Theology; Comparative Theology: Deep Learning Across Religious Borders; Reading the Hindu and Christian Classics: Why and How it Matters; and his recently published memoir, Priest and Scholar, Catholic and Hindu: A Love Story. We spoke about his extraordinary life and the spiritual benefits of reaching beyond our borders. 

Daniel McKanan is a senior lecturer at Harvard Divinity School, occupying a chair named after Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Faculty Director for the school’s Program for the Evolution of Spirituality. His scholarly work focuses on religious and spiritual movements for social transformation in the united states and beyond, with an additional focus on the Unitarian Universalist tradition and the Anthroposophical movement, which was founded by Rudolph Steiner in the early 20th century.

 Professor McKanan is the author of six books, including Prophetic Encounters: Religion and the American Radical Tradition; Eco-alchemy: Anthroposophy and the History and Future of Environmentalism; and most recently Camphill and the Future: Spirituality and Disability in an Evolving Communal Movement. He is also deeply involved in the training of Unitarian Universalist ministers and scholars and has served as board chair of the International Communal Studies Association. 

Dana Sawyer is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy and World Religions at the Maine College of Art & Design. The author of biographies of two prominent 20th Century thinkers, Aldous Huxley (2002) and Huston Smith (2017), his primary expertise is in Hinduism and Buddhism. For more than twenty years Dana's work has focused on comparative mysticism, theories of the “perennial philosophy,” and the value of psychedelic experience in the study of mysticism. His most recent books are an analysis of the Transcendental Meditation Movement for Cambridge University Press (2023), and The Perennial Philosophy Reloaded, published by Monkfish in July, 2024. Our conversation focused on that last book, whose subject, Perennialism, is vital for understanding spirituality in today's complex, pluralistic landscape. 

www.danasawyer.com

Kaira Jewel Lingo lived for 15 years as an ordained nun in Thich Nhat Hanh’s monastic community, Plum Village. She now teaches internationally in the Zen and Vipassana traditions, as well as in a secular mindfulness context. Her work is at the intersection of racial, climate and social justice with a focus on activists, black, indigenous, and people of color, as well as artists, educators, families, and youth.

Her work continues the Engaged Buddhism developed by Thich Nhat Hanh, interweaving nature, ecology, embodied mindfulness practice, art and play. She draws inspiration from her parents’ lives of service and her father’s work with Martin Luther King, Jr. She’s the author of We Were Made for These Times: Ten Lessons in Moving Through Change, Loss and Disruption and the co-author of Healing Our Way Home: Black Buddhist Teachings on Ancestors, Joy and Liberation. She is married to, and sometimes works with, Adam Bucko, who has also been a guest on this podcast. 

https://www.kairajewel.com/books 

https://plumvillage.org/about/thich-nhat-hanh

Paul John Roach is a native of Wales, UK. He earned BA and MA degrees in English from Oxford University and a postgraduate degree in education from the University of Wales. Paul was ordained at Unity Ministerial School in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1988 and served as the senior minister at Unity of Fort Worth until his retirement in 2018. He has also served the Unity movement in other ways, including as a board member of Unity World Headquarters.

For 14 years, Paul hosted a program on Unity FM titled World Spirituality, where he interviewed spiritual leaders and authors from around the world. He is the author of the award-winning book Unity and World Religions, which focuses on the perennial philosophy within all spiritual traditions, which is prime focus of this conversation. 

Paul John Roach web site

Connect with the host of Spirit Matters- Philip Goldberg