religious studies

We want people who grew up or are growing up in right-wing Christian environments to understand that it’s okay to trust their doubts; and [because] there’s still a pretty strong taboo in the American public sphere against criticizing any large Christian group we hope this book will help [change that].

Evangelical authoritarianism is a problem that the American mainstream as a rule fails to treat with the seriousness it demands, in part because it’s easy to laugh at the antics of a Robert Jeffress while assuming that more respectable conservative evangelicals are more moderate and more numerous.

This history clearly shows why most courts in the United States are reticent to accept brainwashing theories today. The science underlying such claims is faulty, and courts have realized that accepting such claims undercuts the very basis of the legal system, which is that individuals are responsible for their own actions.

In a series of pieces, RD contributors debate whether or not it’s proper and meaningful to label the ideology behind the terrorist attack on a New Zealand mosque “Christian” nationalism or simply “white nationalism.”

We’ve used our increased visibility, often through hashtag campaigns, to expose evangelical authoritarianism to the broader American public, something that major media outlets have mostly failed to do.

When asked to write about McCain’s religion I thought I’d review the alignment between the American military and American religions. What I found is as much about what the American public needs to hear about religion as it was about what McCain felt or thought about religion.

This piece is a response to Andrea Jain’s “Fox News Controversy on Yoga Reveals Problem of Yoga Discussion.” Read Jain’s response here.Nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their…

Where is the line between keeping scholars honest and undercutting them, especially when such scholarship is meant to shine a light on systemic inequality?

The Sisters are an order of self-named queer nuns who parody Roman Catholicism, and at the same time make an earnest and very serious claim to be nuns—just not Roman Catholic ones.

Many think they’re mocking nuns, but parody or camp and mockery are often very different things. In fact, one of the easiest ways to move a Sister to tears is to tell her that nuns from other orders (Roman Catholic, Buddhist, etc.) recognize and respect her work.