Download or read book Secular Spirituality written by Lynn L. Sharp and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2006 with total page 282 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Secular Spirituality challenges the traditional dichotomy between Enlightenment reason and religion. It follows French romantic socialists' and spiritists' search for a new spirituality based on reincarnation as a path to progress for individuals and society. Leaders like Allan Kardec argued for social reform; spiritist groups strove for equality; and women mediums challenged gender roles. Lynn L. Sharp looks closely at what it meant to practice spiritism, analyszing the movement's social and political critique and explaining the popularity of the new belief. She explores points of convergence and conflict in the interplay between spiritism and science, spiritism and psychology, and spiritism and the Catholic church to argue that the nineteenth century was not as 'disenchanted' as has been thought. Secular Spirituality successfully places spiritism within a larger cultural conversation, going beyond the leaders of the movement to look at the way spiritism functioned for its followers.

Download or read book Lourdes written by Ruth Harris and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 2008-09-04 with total page 702 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lourdes was at the very centre of nineteenth century debates on religion, science and medicine. Both the Church and secularists championed the 'miracle' town as crucial in shaping how society should think about the mind, body and spirit. Since the ‘visions’ of Bernadette Soubirous in 1858 transformed the quiet Pyrenean town into an international tourist and pilgrimage destination, it has been a site for controversy. In her well-crafted and carefully researched book, Harris deftly places Lourdes and its attendant spiritual movement firmly at the centre of French history and shows its significance in the country’s development.

Download or read book A Science for the Soul written by Corinna Treitel and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2004-04-20 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In A Science for the Soul, historian Corinna Treitel explores the appeal and significance of German occultism in all its varieties between the 1870s and the 1940s, locating its dynamism in the nation's struggle with modernization and the public's dissatisfaction with scientific materialism. Occultism, Treitel notes, served as a bridge between traditional religious beliefs and the values of an increasingly scientific, secular, and liberal society. Drawing on a wealth of archival materials, Treitel describes the individuals and groups who participated in the occult movement, reconstructs their organizational history, and examines the economic and social factors responsible for their success. Building on this foundation, Treitel turns to the question of how Germans used the occult in three realms of practice: Theosophy, where occult studies were used to achieve spiritual enlightenment the arts, where occult states of consciousness fueled the creative process of avant-garde painters, writers, and dancers and the applied sciences, where professionals in psychology, law enforcement, engineering, and medicine employed occult techniques to solve characteristic problems of modernity. In conclusion, Treitel considers the conflicting meanings occultism held for contemporaries by focusing on the anti-spiritualist campaigns mounted by the national press, the Protestant and Catholic Churches, local and national governments, and the Nazi regime, which after years of alternating between affinity and antipathy for occultism, finally crushed the movement by 1945.

Download or read book The Secularization of the European Mind in the Nineteenth Century written by Owen Chadwick and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1990-09-13 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Owen Chadwick's acclaimed lectures on the secularisation of the European mind trace the declining hold of the Church and its doctrines on European society in the nineteenth century.

Download or read book Immaculate Powerful written by Clarissa W. Atkinson and published by Beacon Press (MA). This book was released on 1985 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: