Event, Meditation, Return to the Land, National Socialist Club-131, Church of Immortal Consciousness, Jehovah's Witnesses, LGB
Cheetah House: Learn what Chinese Buddhism can teach us about the adverse effects of meditation. (September 17)
The Conversation: An Arkansas group's effort to build a white ethnostate forms part of a wider US movement inspired by white supremacy
The Guardian: I was a chess prodigy trapped in a religious cult. It left me with years of fear and self-loathing
"We know that a certain percentage of people experience adverse side-effects from practicing meditation. While contemporary scientific literature is just beginning to document these phenomena, Buddhist communities across Asia have for millennia warned practitioners about "meditation sickness." In China, historical writings were explicit about these dangers, not only identifying the symptoms of adverse events but also explaining why these issues arise and how they can be effectively prevented and treated. What can we learn from reading 1500-year-old texts about meditation sickness? Could taking these materials seriously transform the way we think about meditation in the West."
This talk will be eligible for APA CE credit.
Professor Salguero specializes in the intersections between Buddhism and medicine. He has a PhD from Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and teaches at Penn State University's Abington College.
The Conversation: An Arkansas group's effort to build a white ethnostate forms part of a wider US movement inspired by white supremacy
"In October 2023, a group calling itself Return to the Land established its first "Whites only community" in the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas. They followed that with a second enclave nearby in 2025.
The group, which describes itself as a "private membership association" that helps groups form "European heritage communities," plans to build four more sites, including another location in the Ozarks and two in Appalachia.
Return to the Land believes that by calling themselves a private membership association they can create a white ethnostate – a type of state in which residence is limited to white people – and legally exclude people based on race, religion and sexual orientation.
If you read the words of Eric Orwoll, the group's co-founder, its mission is clear: "You want a white nation? Build a white town … it can be done. We're doing it."
As a scholar of right-wing extremism, I have examined several groups calling for a white homeland in America. The creation of a white ethnostate is often seen as an ultimate goal of such white nationalism, which argues that white people form part of a genetically and culturally superior race deserving of protection and preservation. While Return to the Land doesn't identify as white nationalists, their statements often align with the ideology."
" ... [T]he People's Initiative of New England, a splinter group of the neo-Nazi organization National Socialist Club-131, introduced themselves on the online platform Substack. There, the group laid out its goal of establishing the six states of New England – Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont – as white-only.
The goal of gaining control of multiple states is unrealistic, of course, at least peacefully. Therefore, a popular alternative, along the lines of Return to the Land's actions, is to establish smaller all-white communities."
The Guardian: I was a chess prodigy trapped in a religious cult. It left me with years of fear and self-loathing
Growing up dirt poor in Arizona's Church of Immortal Consciousness, I showed an early talent for the game. Soon the cult's leader began grooming me to become a grandmaster – even if it meant separating me from my mother.
" ... My mother was a lost soul, and it was because of her wayward spiritual wanderings that we ended up in the Church of Immortal Consciousness – which was known internally as the Collective, or the Family. It originated with the teachings of Dr Pahlvon Duran, who lived his last lifetime as an Englishman in the 15th century. But Duran's teachings had not been passed down to us in stone tablets or through some ancient text. They were channelled through a trance medium named Trina Kamp who was first visited by the spirit of Duran when she was nine years old.
In the Church of Immortal Consciousness, run by Trina and her svengali husband/manager, Steven Kamp, we were taught that "there is no death and there are no dead". Your soul inhabited a body so that it could learn lessons. You've had many lifetimes, and you may have many more lifetimes to come. Finding and fulfilling your "purpose" was of the greatest importance, and before you could achieve it you had to live a morally upright life. Integrity was the key concept. If you succeeded in keeping your word and being a good person, you were said to be "in integrity". If you failed, you were said to be "out of integrity", which was considered the gravest of sins in the Collective.
Finding your purpose was in part about what you were meant to achieve in life as an individual, but it was also about the life you would pursue together with a partner in raising a family. Finding the right partner meant finding your "like vibration". A like vibration is an energy, an electric, pulsating vibration emanating from the centre of the universe and living inside us. Sharing a like vibration basically meant having a healthy marriage, and a common vision about how to raise children and handle money. If your marriage was struggling, often the validity of your like vibration was brought into question."
"Nikola from Latvia gives fellow Jehovah's Witness youths a masterclass in how to respectfully tell their gay classmates that their sexuality is wrong."