popular culture

A Nigerian-born Catholic has crashed the American wedding of faith and football by refusing to hold his peace. Bennet Omalu—who is played by Will Smith in the movie Concussion—believes that providence…

Running the gamut from religious fundamentalists to closet atheists, reality TV scandal to serious theological debate, here are the most popular posts from RD in 2015. #10 Churches Can No Longer Hide…

A Q&A with S. Brent Plate

Another Christmas, another string of outrages about the supposed “War on Christmas.” In November there was the social media furor about Starbucks’ red cups, as Ed Simon relates here in RD. Then this…

In the 1640s, during the years of the English civil wars, a popular broadsheet with the title The World Turned Upside Down became the equivalent of a blockbuster. In the chaos of the era print was…

Once again, RD’s editors have asked me to think about stories at the intersection of religion and culture that mainstream journalism passes over or treats inadequately. It takes a sour disposition to…

On December 5 th the New York Times published an editorial on its front page for the first time since 1920 to criticize politicians and call for more stringent gun control and regulation. But that was…

A new Star Wars film premieres this week, accompanied by the kind of social ferment usually reserved for presidential elections—or in the case of this year, papal visits. Beyond George Lucas’ classic…

Shortly after November’s horrific terrorist attacks in Paris, Al-Aqsa mosque in Philadelphia received a phone message stating, “I hope you people are happy about what you did in Paris. I’d like to…

An excerpt from Asma Afsaruddin’s new book, “Contemporary Issues in Islam.”