Religion, justice, and violence.

I wish I were going to be in Virginia on Friday for the University of Virginia’s Levinson Lectures on “Religion, Justice, and Violence.” René Girard, Mark Juergensmeyer, Khalel Abou El-Fadl, and Danièle Hervieu-Leger are the featured speakers. I don’t know Hervieu-Leger’s work, but Girard is extraordinary, and I’ve reviewed Juergensmeyer’s book Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence (scroll to the bottom) and Abou El-Fadl’s essay “The place of tolerance in Islam” in UU World. If you’re in the area, this all-day forum would be well worth your time.