Soul

• Thirty-one years ago, after a haunting rendition of Bob Marley’s song “War,” O’Connor ripped up a photograph of Pope John Paul II on live television.
• “Fight the real enemy,” she said – a reference to clerical sex abuse.
• For months afterward, she was banned, booed and mocked, dismissed as a crazy rebel beyond the pale.
• The exquisite freedom in her music cannot be disentangled from that something transcendent that she was always after.

‘Rescuing God from religion’

• But she was also open in her love of other aspects of the faith, albeit often in unorthodox ways.
• Ten years after her SNL performance, O'Connor took courses at a seminary in Dublin with a Catholic Dominican priest, Rev.
• In a 2007 interview with Fordham University’s WFUV radio station, O'Connor said that she was hoping the album could show God to people when religion itself had blocked their access to God.
• It was a kind of “rescuing God from religion,” to “lift God out of religion.” Rather than preaching or writing, “music is the little way that I do that,” she said, adding, “I say that as someone who has a lot of love for religion.”

Reading the prophets

• The great Jewish thinker Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel’s book “The Prophets” begins with this sentence: “This book is about some of the most disturbing people who have ever lived.” Over and over, the Bible shows the prophets – the prophets who inspired “Theology” – mounting bracing assaults on hypocrisies and insincerities in their own religious communities, and not politely or calmly.
• It was not just a critique of child abuse but of church officials’ professed compassion for children – sanctimonious pieties as they covered up the abuse.
• But for many admirers, as the documentary “Nothing Compares” makes clear, all this showed that she was free, and like the prophets of old, unashamed and unafraid to provoke.

Rasta to Islam

• At the same time, O’Connor’s religious imagination was so much more than a complex relationship with Catholicism.
• She counted among her spiritual heroes Muhammad Ali – and converted to Islam in 2018, changing her name to Shuhada’ Sadaqat.
• Yet O’Connor’s vision was not fragmented, as if she were constantly chasing after bits and pieces.

• Most of us know Henry Lawson and Judith Wright are icons of Australian literature.
• On AustLit, the Australian literature database, only ten of the 788 items on Lawson mention his deafness.
• Read more:
  Les Murray said his autism shaped his poetry – his late poems offer insights into his creative process

Henry Lawson: deafness inherent to his writing

• It is difficult to precisely describe his level of deafness from then on, but he needed anyone speaking to him to be close by and to face him.
• His deafness remained a key influence on his content and style throughout his 35-year writing career.
• He wrote about his own deafness in essays such as A Fragment of Autobiography, and poems such as The Soul of a Poet.
• Hearing people often make deafness a constant focus when they write deaf characters – but in his stories, he would often only mention a character’s deafness once.
• Deafness was also part of his writing style.

Judith Wright’s deafness: ‘creatively generative’

• Three years later, she was diagnosed with otosclerosis, a form of atypical bone growth within the middle ear that causes progressive hearing loss.
• Her deafness meant she was denied entry into the women’s forces during World War II.
• When the servicemen returned and her role became insecure, she made a critical decision, one directly informed by her deafness.
• Read more:
  Friday essay: Judith Wright in a new light

Ignoring disability has consequences

• And often the exceptions, like I Can Jump Puddles (1955) by Alan Marshall, who was partially paralysed as a result of childhood polio, are interpreted as narratives of overcoming disability – rather than the narrative of disability pride that they are.
• When they grow up to be publishers, teachers, librarians, editors, and booksellers, they unthinkingly pass this message on to the next generation by continuing to omit disability from Australian writing.
• The consequences of erasing disability from Australian literature are worse for disabled readers and writers.
• Like Lawson and Wright, renowned Australian poet Les Murray acknowledged his disability (autism) for decades before his death, starting in 1974.
• When we understand impairment as a complex condition rather than simply a deficit, we realise disability engenders creativity.

• CPS ( https://CPS.Africa/ ), the largest private real estate developer in Tanzania, is thrilled to announce its latest project in Fumba Town - "The Soul Fumba."
• Additionally, he expressed sincere appreciation to key stakeholders, including the Government of Zanzibar, for their invaluable support in achieving this significant milestone.
• CPS aims to create a welcoming environment for international investors interested in the Zanzibar real estate market.
• The panel aimed to explore the potential opportunities in the real estate sector spurred by the thriving tourism industry.

• ORLANDO, Fla., Jan. 26, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- The Chopra Foundation today announced The Soul of Leadership, an initiative focusing on mental well-being and leadership development within the Black community.
• In partnership with Robert F. Smith and in collaboration with the NeverAlone movement, this initiative will focus on providing mental health services, leadership development courses targeted towards Black youth, and content to support Black entrepreneurs.
• "I am privileged to work with Robert Smith on this much-needed initiative for the empowerment of our future leaders, particularly from the Black American community," said Dr. Deepak Chopra, founder of The Chopra Foundation.
• Starting in early 2023, The Soul of Leadership's online portal will offer a free virtual catalog of leadership development courses.