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Discussions about religion with Greg Soden.

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#220
June 29 · 46 min
Susannah Crockford, "A Perturbed System: Religion and Climate Change from the End of a World" (U Chicago Press, 2026)
Our ecological system is disturbed, and with it, every other system we’ve built to inhabit it. We do not face inevitable destruction, yet many of us cannot conceive of climate change as anything but the end of the world, an apocalypse with all its biblical trappings. Why? In A Perturbed System: Religion and Climate Change from the End of a World, anthropologist Susannah Crockford argues that we must understand the climate emergency as a spiritual crisis, a result of Christian colonialism that
#219
June 7 · 37 min
Annie Selak, "The Wounded Church: Tending to the Harm within Catholicism" (Fordham UP, 2026)
Dr. Annie Selak (she/her/hers) is an expert in feminist ecclesiology. She studies wounds in the church, or moments where the church fails to live into its mission and causes harm. Racism, sexism, and the clergy sex abuse crisis are examples of the church failing to credibly be church. Guided by a feminist methodology, Selak integrates the lived experience of women with a robust vision for the church. Selak serves as a Visiting Scholar in the Center on Faith and Justice while working as a campus
#218
May 13 · 40 min
Kira Ganga Kieffer, "Unvaccinated Under God: Religion and Vaccine Hesitancy in Modern America" (Princeton UP, 2026)
Kira Ganga Kieffer (Visiting Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, Wesleyan University; PhD, Boston University, 2023) studies contemporary American spiritualities, health, gender, and marketing. Her first book, a history of religion and vaccine skepticism, Unvaccinated Under God: Religion and Vaccine Hesitancy in Modern America (Princeton UP, 2026), is forthcoming from Princeton University Press. She is the author of “Smelling Things: Essential Oils and Essentialism in Contemporary America
#260
April 23 · 42 min
Liz Bucar, "Beyond Wellness: How Restoring the Religious Roots of Spiritual Practices Can Heal Us" (Penguin, 2026)
Liz Bucar is a religious ethicist and professor of religion at Northeastern University, as well as a certified intenSati and Kripalu yoga instructor. Her popular writing has appeared in The Atlantic, the Los Angeles Times, Teen Vogue, and The Wall Street Journal, and she is the author of four books, including the award-winning Stealing My Religion and Pious Fashion. She lives in Brookline, Massachusetts. For more about how religion shapes us all, even if we don’t believe, subscribe to Liz’s news
#236
February 9 · 52 min
Charles Alistair McCrary, "Sincerely Held: American Secularism and Its Believers" (U Chicago Press, 2022)
"Sincerely held religious belief" is now a common phrase in discussions of American religious freedom, from opinions handed down by the US Supreme Court to local controversies. The "sincerity test" of religious belief has become a cornerstone of US jurisprudence, framing what counts as legitimate grounds for First Amendment claims in the eyes of the law. In Sincerely Held: American Secularism and Its Believers (U Chicago Press, 2022), Charles McCrary provides an original account of how sincerely
#259
Apr 11, 2024 · 31 min
Elyse Ambrose, "A Blackqueer Sexual Ethics: Embodiment, Possibility, and Living Archive" (T&T Clark, 2024)
In A Blackqueer Sexual Ethics: Embodiment, Possibility, and Living Archive (T&T Clark, 2024), Elyse Ambrose looks to an archive of blackqueerness as an authoritative source for religious ethical reflection. This approach counters the disintegrative norms of anti-black and anti-body traditionalism in Christian sexual ethics, even those that strive to be liberative. It builds upon a tradition of black queer and LGBTQ+-centered critique at the intersections of race, sexuality, gender, and religion
#258
Mar 11, 2024 · 36 min
Aizaiah G. Yong, "Multiracial Cosmotheandrism: A Practical Theology of Multiracial Experiences" (Orbis, 2023)
In Multiracial Cosmotheandrism: A Practical Theology of Multiracial Experiences (Orbis, 2023), Aizaiah G. Yong critically considers how the lives and spiritual experiences of mixed-race people can transform efforts for racial justice across the planet. Yong is inspired by the life and philosophy of Raimon Panikkar, a twentieth-century interreligious spiritual leader whose own experiences of the world were foundationally shaped by his life as a mixed-race person. This book focuses on the experien
#257
Feb 4, 2024 · 41 min
Danielle Dulsky, "Bones & Honey: A Heathen Prayer Book" (New World Library, 2023)
Bones & Honey: A Heathen Prayer Book (New World Library, 2023)l is a collection of nature-inspired prayers, mythic incantations, stories, and pagan poetry that can be enjoyed slowly or all at once. It will resonate with anyone looking to soothe the wounds of modernity with eco-devotional language, spellwork, and daily spiritual nourishment. Danielle Dulsky speaks to the expanding movement of those returning to slow, simple living and cultivating an Earth-inspired, sustainable existence. Organize
#256
Jan 11, 2024 · 44 min
Darnise C. Martin, "Beyond Christianity: African Americans in a New Thought Church" (NYU Press, 2005)
Darnise C. Martin's Beyond Christianity: African Americans in a New Thought Church (NYU Press, 2005) draws on rich ethnographic work in a Religious Science church in Oakland, California, to illuminate the ways a group of African Americans has adapted a religion typically thought of as white to fit their needs and circumstances. This predominantly African American congregation is an anomalous phenomenon for both Religious Science and African American religious studies. It stands at the intersecti
#255
Oct 8, 2023 · 38 min
Oluwatomisin Olayinka Oredein, "The Theology of Mercy Amba Oduyoye: Ecumenism, Feminism, and Communal Practice" (U Notre Dame Press, 2023)
Oluwatomisin Olayinka Oredein's book The Theology of Mercy Amba Oduyoye: Ecumenism, Feminism, and Communal Practice (U Notre Dame Press, 2023) explores African theologian Mercy Amba Oduyoye’s constructive initiative to include African women’s experiences and voices within Christian theological discourse. Mercy Amba Oduyoye, a renowned Ghanaian Methodist theologian, has worked for decades to address issues of poverty, women’s rights, and global unrest. She is one of the founders of the Circle of
#254
Jul 15, 2023 · 53 min
Sara Moslener, "Virgin Nation: Sexual Purity and American Adolescence" (Oxford UP, 2015)
First taking hold of the American cultural imagination in the 1990s, the sexual purity movement of contemporary evangelicalism has since received considerable attention from a wide range of media outlets, religious leaders, and feminist critics. Virgin Nation: Sexual Purity and American Adolescence (Oxford UP, 2015) offers a history of this movement that goes beyond the Religious Right, demonstrating a link between sexual purity rhetoric and fears of national decline that has shaped American ide
#253
Jun 18, 2023 · 50 min
Orit Avishai, "Queer Judaism: LGBT Activism and the Remaking of Jewish Orthodoxy in Israel" (NYU Press, 2023)
Until fairly recently, Orthodox people in Israel could not imagine embracing their LGBT sexual or gender identity and staying within the Orthodox fold. But within the span of about a decade and a half, Orthodox LGBT people have forged social circles and communities and become much more visible. This has been a remarkable shift in a relatively short time span. Queer Judaism offers the compelling story of how Jewish LGBT persons in Israel created an effective social movement. Drawing on more than
#252
Mar 14, 2023 · 42 min
Stephen Prothero, "God, the Bestseller: How One Editor Transformed American Religion a Book at a Time" (HarperOne, 2023)
New York Times bestselling author and acclaimed religion scholar, Stephen Prothero, captures the compelling and unique saga of twentieth-century America on an identity quest through the eyes and books of one of the most influential editors of the day—a search, born of two world wars, for resolution of our divided identity as a Christian nation and a nation of religions. One summer evening in 1916 in Blanchester, Ohio, a sixteen-year-old farm boy was riding his horse past the town cemetery. The h
#251
Feb 25, 2023 · 42 min
Jonathan Homrighausen, "Planting Letters and Weaving Lines: The Song of Songs, and The Saint Johns Bible" (Liturgical Press, 2022)
The illuminations of The Saint John’s Bible have delighted many with their imaginative takes on Scripture. But many struggle to appreciate the calligraphy more deeply than merely noting its beauty. Does calligraphy mean something? How is it beautiful? Planting Letters and Weaving Lines: The Song of Songs, and The Saint Johns Bible (Liturgical Press, 2022), written by a biblical scholar who has spent years working with this Bible, shows how calligraphic art powerfully interplays visual form, text
#250
Dec 13, 2022 · 52 min
David Newheiser, "The Varieties of Atheism: Connecting Religion and Its Critics" (U Chicago Press, 2022)
David Newheiser is a senior research fellow in the Institute for Religion and Critical Inquiry at Australian Catholic University. He is the author of Hope in a Secular Age: Deconstruction, Negative Theology, and the Future of Faith. The Varieties of Atheism: Connecting Religion and Its Critics (U Chicago Press, 2022) reveals the diverse nonreligious experiences obscured by the combative intellectualism of Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and Christopher Hitchens. In fact, contributors contend that n
#249
Dec 12, 2022 · 56 min
Jason Ananda Josephson Storm, "Metamodernism: The Future of Theory" (U Chicago Press, 2021)
For decades, scholars have been calling into question the universality of disciplinary objects and categories. The coherence of defined autonomous categories—such as religion, science, and art—has collapsed under the weight of postmodern critiques, calling into question the possibility of progress and even the value of knowledge. Jason Ānanda Josephson Storm aims to radicalize and move beyond these deconstructive projects to offer a path forward for the humanities and social sciences using a new
#248
Nov 21, 2022 · 48 min
Eric Vanden Eykel, "The Magi: Who They Were, How They've Been Remembered, and Why They Still Fascinate" (Fortress Press, 2022)
George Tyrrell insisted that the quest for the historical Jesus was no more than scholars staring into a well to see their own reflections staring back. Jesus is the mirror image of those who study him. A similar phenomenon accompanies the quest for the historical Magi, those mysterious travelers who came from the East, following a star to Bethlehem. In this work, ancient historian and scholar Eric Vanden Eykel helps readers better understand both the Magi and the ancient and modern interpreters
#231
Nov 17, 2022 · 42 min
On Religion, Public Health, and the Media
Amanda Furiasse received her PhD in Religion and Graduate Certificate in Museum Studies from Florida State University in 2018. Her research unfolds at the convergence of religion, health, and technology and explores how African communities use religious ritual as a mechanism to heal from violence and trauma. She is Co-Founder and Curator at the Religion, Art, and Technology Lab where she produces multi-sensory exhibitions for the public on the relationship between faith, aesthetics, and innovati
#230
Nov 16, 2022 · 1 hr 6 min
On the Rise of the Muslim Sitcom
Kristian Petersen is Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy & Religious Studies at Old Dominion University. He is the author of Interpreting Islam in China: Pilgrimage, Scripture, and Language in the Han Kitab (Oxford University Press in 2017), and editor of Muslims in the Movies: A Global Anthology (ILEX Foundation & Harvard University Press, 2021), and New Approaches to Islam in Film (Routledge, 2021). He also co-hosts the New Books in Islamic Studies podcast on the New Books Netw
#229
Nov 15, 2022 · 1 hr 8 min
On Migrational Religion and the Latinx Diaspora
Dr. João Chaves and Dr. Arlene Sánchez-Walsh discuss Brazil and the book Migrational Religion: Context and Creativity in the Latinx Diaspora, out now from Baylor University Press.

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