In this conversation, Host Michael Lerner talks with author and professor Jeffrey Kripal about his book Kali’s Child: The Mystical and the Erotic in the Life and Teachings of Ramakrishna. This was a revised version of his PhD dissertation at the University of Chicago. It was greeted with acclaim in the West and with vitriol by Hindu fundamentalists. It begins Kripal's long study of homoerotic themes in world religions.

Jeffrey J. Kripal

Jeff holds the J. Newton Rayzor Chair in Philosophy and Religious Thought at Rice University. He also co-directs the Center for Theory and Research at Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California. Jeff is the author of numerous books, most recently How to Think Impossibly: About Souls, UFOs, Time, Belief, and Everything Else. His remarkable website jefrreyjkripal.com describes his groundbreaking 13 books and his entire oeuvre. This series of conversations explores all 13 books.

Host Michael Lerner

Michael is founder and board chair emeritus of Commonweal. His principal work at Commonweal is with the Cancer Help Program, CancerChoices.org, the Omega Resilience Projects, the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, and The New School at Commonweal. He was the recipient of a MacArthur Prize Fellowship for contributions to public health in 1983 and is author of Choices in Healing: Integrating the Best of Conventional and Complementary Therapies (MIT Press).

In this conversation, Host Michael Lerner talks with author and professor Jeffrey Kripal about his book The Secret Body: Erotic and Esoteric Currents in the History of Religions. Jeffrey considers this unusual autobiographical journey through his work as the key to much of the rest of his 13-volume oeuvre, which will be examined throughout this series of conversations.

Jeffrey J. Kripal

Jeff holds the J. Newton Rayzor Chair in Philosophy and Religious Thought at Rice University. He also co-directs the Center for Theory and Research at Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California. Jeff is the author of numerous books, most recently How to Think Impossibly: About Souls, UFOs, Time, Belief, and Everything Else. His remarkable website jefrreyjkripal.com describes his groundbreaking 13 books and his entire oeuvre. This series of conversations explores all 13 books.

Host Michael Lerner

Michael is founder and board chair emeritus of Commonweal. His principal work at Commonweal is with the Cancer Help Program, CancerChoices.org, the Omega Resilience Projects, the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, and The New School at Commonweal. He was the recipient of a MacArthur Prize Fellowship for contributions to public health in 1983 and is author of Choices in Healing: Integrating the Best of Conventional and Complementary Therapies (MIT Press).

Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

~ The Japanese dialogue in this English language video podcast has been shortened for timing purposes. ~

The way of the Buddha is more a philosophy than a religion. It is a path, not a faith. Its core precepts describe a practice that leads to an experience. Arnold Toynbee once said that the coming of the dharma to the West might prove the greatest event of the 20th century. Shodo Harada Roshi has been described as a teacher's teacher of Zen Buddhism. He is a longtime friend of Commonweal. Come join us for a unique and precious experience of the Buddhist truth, the Buddhist way, and the Buddhist community.

Shodo Harada Roshi

Shodo Harada Roshi is Abbot of Sogen-ji, a 300-year-old Rinzai Zen monastery in Okayama, Japan. He is also Abbot of Tahoma Monastery on Whidbey Island north of Seattle. He founded Enso House, a hospice affiliated with Tahoma, where his students attend the dying. He is a master of Japanese calligraphy, and has conducted demonstrations at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco and the Metropolitan Museum in New York. His translator and colleague, Priscilla Daichi Storandt, is co-abbot at Tahoma and a senior teacher in her own right. Find out more on his website.

Host Michael Lerner

Michael is the president and co-founder of Commonweal. His principal work at Commonweal is with the Cancer Help Program, CancerChoices.org, the Omega Resilience Projects, the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, and The New School at Commonweal. He was the recipient of a MacArthur Prize Fellowship for contributions to public health in 1983 and is author of Choices in Healing: Integrating the Best of Conventional and Complementary Therapies (MIT Press).

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The New School is Commonweal’s learning community and podcast — we offer conversations, workshops, and other events in areas that Commonweal champions: finding meaning, growing health and resilience, advocating for justice, and stewarding the natural world. We make our conversations into podcasts for many thousands of listeners world wide and have been doing this since 2007.

Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

Inspired by Franciscan spirituality and Joanna Macy’s body of teachings known as the Work That Reconnects, Canticle Farm in Oakland, California, brings together more than 40 people living into the question of how we heal ourselves and the planet together. In this conversation, host Serena Bian talks with Anne and Terry Symons-Bucher, founders of Canticle Farm, about the role that trauma healing and conflict transformation plays in building towards beloved community. Through the lived experiences of Terry and Anne, we will dive into the journeys that both have taken to steward communities across cultures in practicing love in the face of difference, conflict, and rupture. Anne served as Joanna Macy’s executive assistant for over two decades, and this conversation will also serve to honor Joanna’s life and work.

Anne and Terry Symons-Bucher are the co-founders of Canticle Farm, located in the Fruitvale District of East Oakland. Inspired by the life of Francis of Assisi, Canticle Farm is a community providing a platform for the Great Turning, one heart, one home, and one block at a time. The Great Turning—the planetary shift from an industrial-growth society to a life-sustaining society—is served by Canticle Farm through local work that fosters forgiveness in the human community and compassion for all beings. Canticle Farm primarily focuses on the poor and marginalized as those who most bear the burden of social and planetary degradation, as well as being those who are first able to perceive the need for the Great Turning. Rooted in spiritual practice, Canticle Farm manifests this commitment by engaging in the Work That Reconnects, integral nonviolence, gift economy, restorative justice practices, urban permaculture, and other disciplines necessary for regenerating community in the 21st Century. Anne and Terry are the parents of five children.

Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

Co-presented with Healing Circles Global

With Host Elin Stebbins Waldal

Join us for a live conversation with Jerry Millhon---father, life partner, friend, educator, and founder of Thriving Communities---as he reflects on the life-changing impact of a devastating bike accident. In this honest and wide-ranging dialogue with guest host Elin Stebbins Waldal of Commonweal’s Healing Circles program, they’ll explore what it means to navigate unexpected change, claim strength in the face of uncertainty, and hold fast to belief when the road ahead is still being written. Together, they’ll reflecton vulnerability, perseverance, and the daily, courageous work of believing in what’s still possible.

Jerry Millhon

Jerry serves as team member for the Thriving Communities Initiative, which began in 2011 as a program of the Whidbey Institute. He was director from 2010 through 2015, focusing on common people doing uncommon work for the common good. Transformational films, storytelling and bringing people together have produced a powerful network of people over the United States who are making positive impact. Jerry previously served as executive director of the Foundation for Vascular Cures in San Francisco, California; director of the Fossil Rim Wildlife Center in Glen Rose, Texas; and headmaster of several independent schools. In August 2024, Jerry was in a bike accident that left him paralyzed from the waist down. Slowly recovering, the healing process has been an uneven and profound experience.

Host Elin Stebbins Waldal

Elin has a diverse background in sales, team management, and public speaking. She is the author of an award-winning memoir that highlights her journey of healing from domestic violence to advocating for its prevention. She is program director of Healing Circles Langley on Whidbey Island in Washington State, where she’s responsible for developing programming, supporting volunteers, community outreach, and fundraising. Committed to community engagement, she’s passionate about creating impactful programs that bring people together in ways that promote healing, learning, and overall well-being.

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The New School is Commonweal’s learning community and podcast — we offer conversations, workshops, and other events in areas that Commonweal champions: finding meaning, growing health and resilience, advocating for justice, and stewarding the natural world. We make our conversations into podcasts for many thousands of listeners world wide and have been doing this since 2007. Please like/follow our YouTube channel for access to our library of more than 400 great podcasts. Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

After years of friendship, Host Rabbi Irwin Keller sits with Dr. Rachel Naomi Remen to explore the influences of her childhood and young life on her lifelong calling as a healer and teacher. Listen closely for the story of her stint as a race car driver. Perhaps you weren’t expecting that.

Rachel Naomi Remen, MD

Rachel is a Professor of Family Medicine at Wright State Boonshoft School of Medicine and the Founder and Founding Director of the Remen Institute for the Study of Health and Illness (RISHI), which was at Commonweal for decades and is currently at Wright State University Boonshoft School of Medicine. She is one of the best known of the early pioneers of wholistic and integrative medicine. As a medical educator, therapist, and teacher, she has enabled many thousands of physicians to find individual meaning and purpose in the practice of medicine and thousands of patients to remember their power to heal. More than 30,000 medical students have completed The Healer’s Art, her groundbreaking curriculum for medical students taught at the majority of medical schools in America. A master storyteller and observer of life, her bestselling books, Kitchen Table Wisdom and My Grandfather’s Blessings have sold more than 2 million copies and have been translated into 21 languages. Rachel has had Crohn’s disease for more than 65 years and her work is a unique blend of the wisdom, strength, and viewpoints of both doctor and patient.

Host Rabbi Irwin Keller

Irwin has served as spiritual leader of Congregation Ner Shalom in Sonoma County since 2008, a post he took while still writing and performing with the San Francisco-based Kinsey Sicks, known as America’s Favorite Dragapella Beautyshop Quartet. His legal advocacy work included authoring the City of Chicago’s first comprehensive human rights law, in effect since 1989, and serving as the Executive Director of the AIDS Legal Referral Panel of the San Francisco Bay Area.

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The New School is Commonweal’s learning community and podcast — we offer conversations, workshops, and other events in areas that Commonweal champions: finding meaning, growing health and resilience, advocating for justice, and stewarding the natural world. We make our conversations into podcasts for many thousands of listeners world wide and have been doing this since 2007. Please like/follow our YouTube channel for access to our library of more than 400 great podcasts. The New School at Commonweal.

A new-old way of living in place is emerging through a variety of projects and pathways where people are deepening their relationship to land and place-making. Join Host Cassandra Lynn Ferrera with Rako Fabionar as they share about how they are personally and professionally engaging in place-based liberation work--and how the kinds of wayfinding and inhabited learning they are exploring to grow and deepen kinship might be of service to other place-based and bioregional projects.

Rako Fabionar cultivates innovative learning environments for folks to experience deeper connection, insight, and well-being. Rako comes from a family of educators, counselors, organizers, and healers and is connected to the Philippines' Boholano and Eskaya indigenous people. Identified as “one who carries medicine” by elders and spirits of three different lineage traditions, Rako has participated in many healings, apprenticeships, trainings, and formal initiation ceremonies over the last two decades. Often sought out as a land listener, he also supports people during transition, with more than 20 years of experience designing a wide range of transformative initiatives for universities, community-based organizations, businesses, and change networks.

Cassandra Lynn Ferrera is a steward of The Center for Ethical Land Transition and Rako is a steward of the Innovative Learning and Living Institute, both programs of Commonweal that are in service of regenerative and equitable futures. Rako and Cassandra are also both residents and co-stewards of Landwell, a 22-acre wayfinding place for regenerative living, cultural innovation, and community resilience.

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The New School is Commonweal’s learning community and podcast — we offer conversations, workshops, and other events in areas that Commonweal champions: finding meaning, growing health and resilience, advocating for justice, and stewarding the natural world. We make our conversations into podcasts for many thousands of listeners world wide and have been doing this since 2007. Please like/follow our YouTube channel for access to our library of more than 400 great podcasts. tns.commonweal.org

Part of the Festival of Sacred Music Series at The New School at Commonweal

Join us for the third in a series of sacred music celebrations at Commonweal, an afternoon duet of sarod and tabla with Manik Khan and Nilan Chaudhuri.

Part of the Festival of Sacred Music Series

These concerts are presented in collaboration with long-time Commonweal friend Toby Symington, executive director of the Lloyd Symington Foundation and transpersonal astrologer. Held at the solstice and equinox, the concerts—and gatherings afterward—are designed to bring people together in a convivial setting around music which delights, inspires, and elevates the soul. From Toby:

Manik Khan has been steeped in the ancient melodies of North Indian classical music since birth. The youngest son of the legendary Sarod maestro, Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, he grew up listening to his father in countless concerts and attending his classes at the esteemed Ali Akbar College of Music in San Rafael, California. He initially studied tabla under the guidance of Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri, but the greater call to follow in the footsteps of his family brought Manik, at the age of 13, to formally train on the Sarod with his father. He spent his formative years accompanying his father on stage, touring for the last decade of his father's extensive and iconic performance career. Manik's own solo career has brought him throughout India, South America, and the United States.

Nilan Chaudhuri is a Bay Area based percussionist, educator, and performer. Initiated into the tradition of Indian Classical Music at the age of five by his father, Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri, Nilan has been performing as a tabla soloist and accompanist for nearly two decades. Drawing inspiration from his father’s innovative approach to classical tabla solo,  Nilan was determined from a young age to be a soloist. In addition to maintaining a rigorous performing schedule, Nilan teaches Tabla throughout the Bay Area as a faculty member at the Ali Akbar College of Music, in San Rafael, and as the Director of Percussion at Chitresh Das Institute, in San Mateo. He also serves as an archivist at the Ali Akbar College of Music, where the construction of a musical archive spanning 40 years of his Father’s work, is underway. It’s his lifelong mission to contribute to the preservation and enrichment of Indian Classical percussion. 

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The New School is Commonweal’s learning community and podcast — we offer conversations, workshops, and other events in areas that Commonweal champions: finding meaning, growing health and resilience, advocating for justice, and stewarding the natural world. We make our conversations into podcasts for many thousands of listeners world wide and have been doing this since 2007. Please like/follow our YouTube channel for access to our library of more than 400 great podcasts. tns.commonweal.org

#indianmusic #sarod #imamcollective #worldmusic

Join us for the culminating event with our spring 2025 visiting scholar Craig Chalquist. We listen to the earth around us, talk about how our dreams reflect events in the world, discuss and practice active imagination, and practice creative writing as a continuation of engaging the imaginal figures who address us.

The New School at Commonweal is a collaborative learning community offering conversations about nature, culture, and inner life---so that we can all find meaning, meet inspiring people, and explore the beauty and grief of our changing world. Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

How can we heal ourselves and the earth? How can we engage with the soul of a place? At Commonweal, we have always been grounded by our home place in the southern end of Point Reyes National Seashore. Though our work takes place around the world these days, we are always rooted here with the lineage of hundreds of healing retreats held on our land at our Retreat Center. Join TNS Host Susan Grelock Yusem in conversation with Visiting Scholar Craig Chalquist about how we can approach land with curiosity and how we can work with our imagination to re-envision our relationship with the land all around us. 

Visiting Scholar Craig Chalquist, PhD

Craig is program director of Consciousness, Psychology, and Transformation at National University and a former associate provost and several other administrative and leadership roles. His background includes group counseling, depth psychology, mythology, ecopsychology, terrapsychology, and philosophy and wisdom studies. He presents, publishes, and teaches at the intersection of psyche, story, nature, reenchantment, and imagination. He has published more than twenty books, including the hopeful Lamplighter Trilogy. His motto is: “Converse with everything!” Visit Chalquist.com.

Host Susan Grelock Yusem, PhD

Susan is a researcher, storyteller, and super-curious human. She believes that psychology can be a generative force for environmental sustainability and social justice. Susan is a depth-based community psychologist who has built teams and led communications for over 20 years in the regenerative food space. Her work is centered in the imaginal and narrative repair. She is a reader, writer, and runner. She serves as Commonweal’s Head of Innovation and Strategy. susangrelockyusem.site

Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.