´Abdu´l-Bahá's Sermon on the Art of Governance   2005

Persian text, with an English introduction and translation by Sen McGlinn and a Dutch translation by Marjolijn van Zutphen.

The ringbound (20 x 20 cm) book of 22 pages,
is SOLD OUT. Rozenburg Academic Publishing are going to bring this out in book form in a year or so with just English and Persian. News of this will be posted here.
Each left page has the Persian original with the translations on the right page.

Church and State   2005
A postmodern political theology

by Sen McGlinn

This is a political theology for the Bahá´í Faith, but it is also a philosophy for living in our globalising, postmodern society. The functional differentiation of society means that government, religion, commerce, art, education and science are increasingly independent, have different social functions, relate differently to one another, and that their lived meanings for us are different. Functional differentiation also drives the pluralism and relativism, global scope and individualisation that characterise postmodern society.
In a society in which religious ritual is the mirror of individual distinctiveness, not of collective identity, in which permanent pluralism means n that no one religion can provide common norms and values, and no ideology should try, and in which the norms of one sphere of life are not transferred to other spheres, religion must find a new understanding of itself, and a new job description for its role in society. The 20th century has taught us that economic affairs cannot be governed by political ideologies, that science must be free of doctrine and political agendas, that church and state must be separated. But it has not provided us with a new world view that explains the postmodern world that we actually experience.
This book draws on the Bahai scriptures, and the Bible and Quran, to show that the differentiation and globalisation of postmodern society are signs that the Kingdom of God is growing in the world.

This book (16 x 25 cm) of 441 pages
costs $US 35 from www.kalimat.com
7 black and white photogrpahs overlaid with texts by Sonja van Kerkhoff

To more Bahá´í related books

The Exchange
- Colonising Oxford  2002

As one of six Leiden artists invited to Oxford for 3 weeks in the context of a twin-city exchange. I decided to do a series of performance projects in Oxford, some of which used the local citizens as my medium.

8 Euros 24 pages with many illustrations in black and white. In English and Dutch.

Most of the text is on this webpage with similiar images in colour

more about this image     

View the postcard     

Dans le jardin des beaux arts   2001

Artists book about a project
by Jacquline Wassen, Sonja van Kerkhoff
and Sen McGlinn

Contents: a little history of the 16 - 17th century Leiden courtyard and the 300 year old arts society, then about the installation and the work from the residency in New Zealand in 2000. See below for an idea of the contents.

• About the project in the courtyard, May - June 2001
• About the project in W(h)anganui, July - August 2000

The book (15 x 20 cm) of 16 pages, 2001,
costs 7 Euros or $US 9. 20 black and white photos and drawings with a full colour cover. Text in Dutch and English. Edition of 400.

Email: sonjavank-AT-hotmail.com

Grains of Salt  1999

Artists book about a project
by Jacquline Wassen, Gaudi Hoedaya, Sonja van Kerkhoff and Sen McGlinn

Contents: text and images about 3 projects in Dutch and English

• Making Salt: performance at ISEA, Manchester, U.K.
• Making Salt: the website
• A site specific installation in 3 parts:
  top level - text, images and mirrors
  next level - the video projection + window images
  the "Dier Me" interactive slide projection

The book (15 x 20 cm) of 16 pages, 1999,
costs 10 Euros. 18 black and white photos with a full colour cover.
Text in Dutch and English. Edition of 300.

Booklet about art by
Sonja van Kerkhoff, 1989 - 1998

Text and images about paintings, prints, installations, performances, and sculpture made between 1989 and 1999. It is more or less the same text as is on this website. See: part one through to part seven

The book (15 x 20 cm) of 16 pages
IS SOLD OUT
33 black and white photos.
Text in English. Edition of 300.

by Sen McGlinn
Article Reprint from the Journal of Church and State, U.S.A.

This article seeks to provide a religious rationale for embracing the multi-centred post-modern society, and for rejecting monist social models. In particular it provides a theological underpinning for the separation of church and state. Its thesis is that church and state are distinct in the Kingdom of God, and the Kingdom of God is growing on earth where church and state are distinct, but closely related. The first part explains the Bahá´í teachings regarding civil government and its relationship to institutional religion, on the basis of selections from the Bahá´íscriptures. It concludes with some elements of a Bahá´í political theology. The second part suggests a metaphysical model that justifies the organic model of society, in which the religious and political order are properly distinct organs with differing logics, and no one organ can control the whole or claim a unique relationship to the divine. The argument in this section is presented in a neoplatonic language common to theologies of the Western monotheistic faiths, in the hope that this approach may be of use for theologians of other Faiths.

The book (15 x 20 cm) of 26 pages, softcover, costs 5 Euros

Email: sonjavank-AT-hotmail.com

Soundings: Essays in Bahá´í Theology   1989

Edited by Sen McGlinn

Contents:

• Writing history in a secular age by Karen Austin
• Father, Son and Holy Spirit in Christianity, Islam, & the Bahá´í Faith
        by Bronwyn Elsmore
• Introduction fo the Bible in modern research by Sen McGlinn


• Anti-positivism, teaching and the Bahá´í Faith by Alison Marshall
• Religious belief and the mutability of scientific theory
        by William Michael
• Is the Bahá´í Faith a world religion? by Moojan Momen

The book (15 x 20 cm) of 64 pages, softcover, (first published in 1989, second edition, 1994)
costs 10 Euros. Five illustrations by Sonja van Kerkhoff.

Email: sonjavank-AT-hotmail.com

New Vessels

epic poem by Sen McGlinn, illustrations by Sonja van Kerkhoff

The poem, New Vessels (self-published in 1987) is a response to Eliot's The Waste Land in the form of a journey through night, a descent into darkness and return to the light. It uses the pattern of resurrection-myth, which couples death and fertility, and the opposed imagery of the apocalyptic and of the voyage of discovery, as pictures of two possibilities in the turning moment of choice.

Sen McGlinn was born in 1956 and grew up in Christchurch, New Zealand. Collections of lyrics appear in 1974 (Dawndreams, College Writers/Caxton Press) and 1984 (Feeding Harbour, self-published).

Larger view of the pages above (146 KB).   About New Vessel series of images

The Edition of 400, 28 page book with 16 illustrations by Sonja van Kerkhoff IS SOLD OUT