Taking the Lane #12: Religion and Bicycles

The twelfth issue of the self-proclaimed "This American Life of feminist bike zines," explores the intersection of bicycling and religion, with surprising results. What do religion and bicycling have in common? It turns out, it's more than just one thing. For some of our contributors to this issue, bicycling has opened their eyes and minds to religion in a new way. For others, it's an escape and alternative. For all of them, a bicycle has proven to be a path to tolerance, acceptance, and openness, whether of an idea, a community, or themselves. One contributor writes about her decision to drop out of seminary school to work at a bike shop. Another describes an encounter with a group of Orthodox cyclists leads a secular Jewish woman to discover new empathy for practices and gender roles she had never understood. A third contributor tells the story of how his passion for bicycling caused a crisis of faith...and gave him the means to resolve it. For a young woman growing up in Nebraska in the 1980s, her bicycle is her salvation from a religion that condemns her sexuality in a fourth story.

This issue of Taking the Lane is guest edited by Kirsten Collins. Contributors are Rebecca Rindler, Carole Snow, Nathan Nykamp, Halley Weaver, Beth Hamon, Maria M. Benet, Stephen Miller, Tracy Halasinski, and Jessie Calkins.