In-person and Zoom Register here for both in-person or Zoom The South Asian saint Shirdi Sai Baba has an ever-growing global diaspora. His inspiration and healing energies are boons reinforced for many by his defiance of religious communitarianism. In welcoming all castes, creeds, and nationalities, Baba offers an alternative to the divisiveness of his time...

ROOM FULL for in- person attendance. Accepting Zoom registration only. RSVP required. Register here Explore sources of peace and non-violence with leading teachers, including: Salam Al-Marayati - Muslim Public Affairs Council Professor Carol Bakhos - UCLA Center for the Study of Religion Rabbi Sharon Brous – Ikar Prof./Rabbi Aryeh Cohen - American Jewish University Aziza Hasan - Executive Director,...

In person (Haines 39) or on Zoom Register here for both in-person or Zoom attendance Returning to UCLA by popular demand, this lecture by Walid Saleh (University of Toronto) provides an overview of the major features of Classical Islam that solidified during the early Abbasid period. Such features include the  rise of major religious sciences...

In Person (Royce 306) or on Zoom Register here How do archaeologists unearth the daily life of people from Jesus’s time? Contrary to popular belief, archaeology of first-century Roman Galilee is not about illustrating or proving the gospels, drawing timelines, or hunting treasure. Rather, it is about understanding the lives of people, just like us,...

In person (Kaplan 365) This guest lecture examines the little known multicultural religious protests to the Spanish Conquest of colonial Latin America.  Such protests began in 1511 under the guidance of Dominican friar Antonio de Montesinos and led to “The Great Debate” in which, for the first time in recorded human history, an entire nation...

In person (Royce 314) Is sacred space protective space? This question lies at the heart of the Sanctuary Movement, the most confrontational progressive religious social movement in the United States since the heyday of the Civil Rights Movement. Modern Sanctuary Movement activists adopted the ancient practice of protecting in designated sanctuaries individuals who stood in...

Presented by the Alan D. Leve Center for Jewish Studies. Co-sponsored by the UCLA Center for the Study of Religion and the UCLA Department of Near Eastern Languages & Cultures. The story of the Twelve Tribes of Israel begins in the Hebrew Bible. But all around the world, there are stories about what happened next...

Registration closed. The room is at capacity. VENUE CHANGE: This event will now be held at the UCLA Faculty Center. Richard Moves Camp, in conversation with the editor and producer of his book My Grandfather’s Altar: Five Generations of Lakota Holy Men, shares stories from this oral-literary narrative account of five generations of Lakota religious tradition....

EVENT CANCELLED. While the usual rendering and  understanding of the Tower of Babel narrative (Gen 11:1–9) presumes the existence of one unified divine and human language (usually Hebrew, but with other candidates) between Eden and Babel, an alternative narrative imagines there having already existed a totality of ‘seventy” languages from the beginning, and only at...

In this book talk, Eric Martin will explore how people of faith can connect their religious traditions with the rise of overtly fascist violence in the United States. With first-hand accounts from the largest white supremacist gathering in modern American history at Unite the Right in Charlottesville, Virginia, Martin will share how the clergy resisting...