A large but soft-spoken crowd gathers in the foyer of the Alex and Allyson Grey's Chapel of Sacred Mirrors (COSM), which overlooks a notorious stretch of nightclubs on West 27th Street. An unfelt air current tickles prayer flags hanging from the ceiling; Nietzsche's infamous quote "God is dead" sways next to a less controversial statement attributed to God: "Nietzsche is dead." The other flags offer inspiration from a wide range of sources: German theologian Meister Eckehart, Bahai's founding prophet Bahaullah, Lao-tzu, Mr. Rogers, William Blake, Alcoholics Anonymous, Monty Python, Nine Inch Nails, Aldous Huxley, Jesus Christ, Mahatma Gandhi, Tool, and the Dalai Lama. The crowd, like the flags, is amassed from similarly far-flung backgrounds—a Russian woman who discovered Alex Grey's artwork on a bottle of imported liquor; an 18-year-old college student from Argentina who is an avid fan of Tool; a tattoo artist from Columbus, Ohio; a onetime hippie mother and her 14-year-old daughter from Boulder, Colorado; a spiritual-healer-in-training from Venezuela; a 32-year-old game designer from Long Island. What they all seem to share is an interest in mystical experience that has been tapped and, in some cases, ignited by the... More >>>