popular culture

Sometimes, the scholarly life means taking delight in unexpectedly relevant news items: a new adaptation of a book one has studied, an unearthed manuscript from one’s period of interest. Other times…

For years, in addition to writing about it numerous times for RD , I’ve included a section on psychedelics and religious experience in my Introduction to Religion course. When I first began to teach…

I really didn’t know what to expect when Joseph Laycock and I bought our tickets for the New England Society for Psychic Research (NESPR) Seekers of the Supernatural Paracon as part of our research…

Over the last several years, there has been growing attention to the role of cultural appropriation in Halloween traditions . And yet, costumes based on religious clothing—such as the sexy nun—seem to…

For most of its existence, religious Satanism has been regarded as either unfit for polite conversation or fodder for sensationalist tabloid media. In the 1990s, Anton LaVey complained, “Whenever I…

Dear Amazon Prime,* As a loyal customer I’m appalled at your latest WOKE stunt and have some questions for you before I cut to the chase. I’ve been watching the new Rings of Power series based on the…

Jana Reiss, a senior columnist for Religion News Service, recently surveyed a number of recent television programs that “ present Mormonism in an unflattering light .” The column’s headline claims…

Last weekend, the Door Christian Fellowship Ministries in McAllen, Texas, mounted an unauthorized, unlicensed and “Christianized” production of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Broadway musical Hamilton . The…

Sculpted, sweating, bare torsos doing push-ups, bulging muscles, two scantily-clad men locked in a fight—they, too, are ripped. A blond, equally fit man shoots at plastic bottles, a man’s hand grasps…

At the Salt Lake City premiere of Under the Banner of Heaven , writer, director, and producer, Dustin Lance Black explained that the series sought to tell a broader story of Mormonism, including…