You might call it the Comic-Con of religion scholars – minus the Vulcan ears and participants dressed up as superheroes. On the other hand, it will feature the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
More than 9,000 attendees are expected to descend on the San Diego Convention Center, and nearby hotels, starting today for the annual meetings of the American Academy of Religion and the Society of Biblical Literature.
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SDSU EVENT
What: In conjunction with the American Academy of Religion, San Diego State University tomorrow will host a free, public program showcasing traditional Daoist rituals. At 10 a.m., there will be an offering rite. At 2 p.m., there will be the “Pacifying the Dragon” performance.
Where: Scripps Cottage on the campus (map at cal.sdsu.edu/contact/maps.htm).
More information: cal.sdsu.edu/ Pacifying_the_Dragon.pdf
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Accompanying this joint conclave will be an army of publishers, who will set up what organizers bill as “the world's largest bookstore specializing in religion and the Bible.”
The program for the four-day meeting is a book in itself, with more than 450 pages of presentations on topics ranging from Islamic feminism to ecology.
In attendance will be some of the top names in religion studies – including Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor, winner of this year's $1.5 million Templeton Prize; Diana Eck, Harvard's leader of a religious diversity program known as the Pluralism Project; and Robert Bellah, longtime UC Berkeley sociologist and co-author of “Habits of the Heart,” a landmark book about America's culture of individualism.
While registration is required to attend convention sessions, one noteworthy public event will be conducted tomorrow at San Diego State University.
Daoists priests from Taiwan will perform an offering rite from 10 a.m. to noon inside Scripps Cottage on the campus.
Then, at 2 p.m., in an adjacent courtyard, the priests will take part in a rare performance of a rite called “Pacifying the Dragon.” They will use hundreds of pounds of rice to create the diagram of a giant dragon, symbolizing a restoration of order to the Earth's energy, said Julius Tsai, assistant professor of East Asian religions at SDSU.
The event will include introductory remarks from scholars of Daoism and Chinese religion.
As for the convention itself, there are several tours planned – including a trip to the San Diego Natural History Museum to see the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibition and a visit to various religious sites: St. Paul's Episcopal Cathedral, Mission San Diego de Alcala, Point Loma Nazarene University (which used to be a theosophical society campus) and St. George Serbian Orthodox Church.
But not all the sessions will be serious. A Monday afternoon panel promises to serve up heaping portions of parody when speakers toss around the growing phenomenon of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
The Church of the FSM grew out of a backlash to the Kansas state Board of Education's decision two years ago to challenge the teaching of evolution (“I and many others around the world are of the strong belief that the universe was created by a Flying Spaghetti Monster,” its founder wrote in an open letter to board members).
While the Kansas board later jettisoned its attempt to offer intelligent design as an alternative to evolution, the Flying Spaghetti Monster deity was just beginning to gather steam – courtesy of the Internet and a devout legion of “Pastafarians.”
Monday's panel will feature three speakers from the University of Florida and one from Syracuse University, with a response from David Chidester, a comparative religion scholar from the University of Cape Town in South Africa. It is part of the religion and pop culture group.
The American Academy of Religion promotes research, publishing and teaching about religion in academia. The Society of Biblical Literature's mission is to foster scholarship of sacred texts. Both are based at Emory University in Atlanta.
Sandi Dolbee: (619) 293-2082; sandi.dolbee@uniontrib.com
