End times have been my obsession for years now. Not necessarily the eschatology of religion (though this cannot be ignored), but rather the impending annihilation of the Real forewarned in the dramatic works of Samuel Beckett. It was, after all, the bleak, barren, Godless landscapes of rubble and bones in Waiting for Godot and Happy Days, culminating with that chilling utterance in Endgame by Clov, who, looking through a telescope from the window of his moribund master's iso

I wasn't a political teenager. Anti-authoritarian and anti-conformist for sure, but that spirit in me never quite translated into any kind of political disposition. If anything, it had its outlet in playing fast, loud, angry and, in retrospect, downright dreadful music. As well, it manifested in general teenage buffoonery (prank calling televangelists and hitting on them live on air; wearing an Elvis jumpsuit to my high school prom). But I never felt compelled towards politic

Lately, I've been getting more and more into world mythology, that superstructure of belief and narrative upon which modern man stands and flourishes, though in an increasingly precarious position today. I picked up "The Hero With A Thousand Faces" by Joseph Campbell to get a better understanding of these mythical foundations upon which our reality is built, to become more aware of their universality and similarities and convergence into the monomyth. I was discussing this c

I'm not a sportsman or sports fan by any definition. Never have been and probably never will be. I'm too skinny, too slow to play myself, and I get bored too easily to be a spectator. But lately I've been taking an interest in the symbolic and ritualistic element of sports – which is to say the religious element. I'm often told that the Old Testament is a depiction of man's struggles – with himself, with nature, with hostile tribes and most importantly, with God. After all, I

A story, the very notion of a story, is a need as deeply embedded in human beings as the need for food and shelter. (Here I was initially tempted to use the word 'hard-wired' in place of 'embedded', but I found it disagreeable, too reductionist and mechanical, too de-humanizing; robots, the antithesis of humans are made of wires, and I find any language that voids humans of their humanity detestable. But embed… What is more human than the bed?). Stories, in all their myriad f

If we're to be truly serious about being serious, which is to say about being Human, it's time we start taking religion seriously. I do not mean in a dogmatic nor literalist sense, but in a sense much more, well, serious. In the same sense we take our own lives and deaths seriously. I know this a shocker coming from me. Kevin Patrick Cullen, the once militant atheist. But roads change people, and people change roads. They're fraught with detours, forks, exits and entrances,