Two Disciples at the Tomb, c.1906
Henry Ossawa Tanner

William-Adolphe Bouguereau
The Three Marys at the Tomb, 1876

Giovanni Bellini, The Descent of Christ into Limbo, c.1475 - 1480

Forthcoming important new book:
"Russia’s New Imperialism: Capital and Ideology"
Ilya Budraitskis and Ilya Matveev
www.sup.org/books/politi...

Our next "Down to Earth" Dialogue will explore case studies of integral agroecology:

📅 23 April 2026, 14:00-15:30 BST
🔗 iern.org/event/downto...

Repatriating Bruno Latour for the Left
logisticsofreligionblog.wordpress.com/2025/02/17/r...

(repost)

"Bergson and Affect: Intensity, Virtuality and the Body"
Miguel José Paley
edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-bergson...

Thanks so much, CCOW. Much appreciated.

New publication:
"Indirectness: A Plea for Truth in Times of Post-Truth"
Ed. Jela Krečič, Jure Simoniti
edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-indirec...

Here is my new article on the nature photography of Brazilian photojournalist Sebastião Salgado. What can we learn from his beautiful work about the "politics of the visual" that directs us at this time of global ecological crisis?

Read here: lsri.campion.ox.ac.uk/sites/defaul...

We have just launched a prize (£5,000) to be awarded for a student-led agroecological project.
Must demonstrate measurable, real-world impact on climate resilience and livelihoods, with a credible path to scale.
Details here: iern.org/laulanie/

Indeed, and our mission is to address this anew in each and every generation - I guess.

10/ When Sec. Hegseth applies the imprecatory Psalms to his war effort and glorifies violence in God's name: “I pursued my enemies and overtook them, and did not turn back till they were consumed” - he is co-opting Christianity by means of a heresy that was identified as such by the early church.

9/ Most of all, Voegelin warns us against falling for a false (= ersatz) version of Christianity based on (what he calls) "metastatic eschatology" - when we "leap" out of being in reach of some future vision of utopia, which it turns out is undergirded by a human, all-too-human political ideology.

8/ By contrast, Voegelin calls us to dwell in "the Metaxy", rather than escape it. To remain humble, rather than ideological. To resist Gnostic closure and its contemporary prophets. And to trust that the end is known only to God, not to us.

7/ It is precisely this Metaxy that Hegseth's rhetoric is directed to undercut and simplify. For him, the provisionality of reality can be prematurely unified by means of unilateral political power, backed up (in his case) by the mandate of the supposed Christian God. youtube.com/watch?v=OmGK...

6/ For Voegelin, Gnostic movements obsure what he calls the "authentic constitution of being". He identifies this with "the Metaxy" (an old Platonic term) - the uncertain space of the in-between where encounters with the divine send us back to the world with humility & self-evaluation.

5/ He argued that if we understand the "ersatz" spirituality that underlies these modern political ideologies, we will be equipped to challenge them and move towards with a more robust, honest and authentic global political order.

4/ Voegelin borrowed the term “Gnosticism” (taken from ancient religious movements) to describe the structure of these modern political ideologies.

3/ Voegelin argued that certain modern ideologies:

- promise ultimate meaning
- offer a utopian vision of salvation (a perfect society)
- demand devotion
- identify enemies or heretics

In other words. they function psychologically & structurally like religions—but without the transcendence.

2/ Voegelin (1901–1985) was an Austrian-born political philosopher who later worked in the United States. He is best known for trying to explain how and why modern political ideologies co-opt religious thematics - even when they claim to be "Christian", or even secular.

1/ To understand the meaning behind some of Pete Hegseth's recent political-religious rhetoric, we could do worse than turn to a short 1960 essay by political philosopher Eric Voegelin entitled: 'Ersatz Religion: The Gnostic Mass Movements of our Time'.

A final chance to register for our event today, for those working at the intersection of religion, politics and ecology - especially those interested in Indigenous wisdom:

"Understanding Integral Agroecology: Theology and Indigenous Wisdom as Practice"
iern.org/event/downto...

“God the Created: Pragmatic Constructive Realism in Philosophy and Theology”
Benjamin J. Chicka
sunypress.edu/Books/G/God-...

“Jacques Derrida and Paul de Man – Letters, 1968–1983”
Translated by Bruno Penteado, Sonja Stojanovic
Edited by Patricia de Man, Martin McQuillan, Kevin Newmark, Marc Redfield

"Dreaming Reality: How Neuroscience and Mysticism Can Unlock the Secrets of Consciousness"
Vladimir Miskovis & Steven Jay Lynn
www.hup.harvard.edu/books/978067...

"The Paris Commune: A Global History"
Quentin Deluermoz
www.versobooks.com/en-gb/produc...

And article here: www.versobooks.com/en-gb/blogs/...

“It must never be forgotten that Western society is not at all modern, but that modernity is a growth within it, in opposition to the classic and Christian tradition”.

Eric Voegelin, "New Science of Politics", p.176

A great opportunity to register for this online event -

"Understanding Integral Agroecology: Theology and Indigenous Wisdom as Practice"

iern.org/event/downto...

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