Episodi

  • #069 - Good News: The Episode!

    #069 - Good News: The Episode!
    Nov 12 2026
    We skip Good News this week to bring you...a bunch of good news! Following the Blue Wave or Blue Tsunami or Blue Godzilla Stomping or whatever we're calling it, we talk about all the good things. BUT ALSO, we take on this emerging media narrative of the "return of the religious left" and ask if that's the best way of understanding what's happening (it's not!), John gushes about his obsession with Senator-Elect Adam Hamilton, and we talk about what Abdul Al-Sayed's win means in a post-9/11 America.
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    1 ora e 6 min
  • #068 - "Midnight Mass" (2021) with Matthew J. Cressler

    #068 - "Midnight Mass" (2021) with Matthew J. Cressler
    Oct 27 2026
    Well, it's somehow been five years since Mike Flanagan's masterful work of Catholic horror, Midnight Mass, was released on Netflix. So we thought it was time to give it a second look. Does it still deserve its reputation as one of the great pieces of work in its genre? Who better to ask than our semi-regular Halloween guest Matthew Cressler, who joined us last year for our discussion of The Exorcist. Matt's new book, Body and Blood: Catholic Horror in America, written with Jack Lee Downey, Kathleen Holscher, and Michael Pasquier comes out today (October 27th), and Midnight Mass plays a not insignificant role in its existence!
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    1 ora e 18 min
  • #067 - Lily Dale and American Spiritualism with Sarah Handley-Cousins

    #067 - Lily Dale and American Spiritualism with Sarah Handley-Cousins
    Oct 15 2026
    Sarah Handley-Cousins is a historian of disability and the military during the Civil War era. She has a PhD in History from the University at Buffalo where she currently teaches. She co-produces Dig: A History Podcast and her newest book, Spiritualism's Place: Reformers, Seekers, and Séances in Lily Dale, was cowritten with her fellow Dig producers Averill Earls, Marissa C. Rhodes, and Elizabeth Garner Masarik. The book is an exploration of Lily Dale, an intentional community in upstate New York that is now the spiritual (and physical) center of Spiritualism, the 19th Century faith movement that sought to eradicate the line between the land of the living and the dead. Sarah joins us to talk about the inspiration for the book, her own experiences with Spiritualism, and the thin line between self-delusion and authentic belief.
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    58 min
  • #066 - The Resurrection of Ned Ludd

    #066 - The Resurrection of Ned Ludd
    Sep 28 2026
    The word Luddite has a lot of unfair negative connotations. It's also almost always misused. In this episode, we look at the recent trend of reevaluating the Luddites - the radical labor rights movement of the early 19th century - in the age of AI and data centers. Who was Ned Ludd? How did he begin a movement? And what does it say about the religious nature of that movement that (spoiler) he never existed? In this episode, we reference Matthew James Seidel's review of Gavin Mueller's Breaking Things At Work in Current Affairs
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    52 min
  • #065 - "Contact" (1997) with Lauren Turek

    #065 - "Contact" (1997) with Lauren Turek
    Sep 8 2026
    (SORRY ABOUT YESTERDAY! Naturally, our production staff have all been fired and fed to the wolves.* We BELIEVE the episode should now be glitch free!) 1997's "Contact", directed by Robert Zemeckis, remains one of the best "What if aliens made contact?" movies ever made. Conceived by astronomer Carl Sagan, the film thoughtfully wrestles with ideas of humanity, religion, and international relations in a way most science fiction merely glance at. This week, we revisit the film with Trinity University professor Dr. Lauren Turek. You can find Lauren on Bluesky @laurenfturek *just kidding, John is the entire production staff
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    1 ora e 9 min
  • #064 - Christopher Nolan's "The Odyssey"

    #064 - Christopher Nolan's "The Odyssey"
    Aug 13 2026
    More summer movie series fun as we (finally) talk about Christopher Nolan's "The Odyssey" after Kelly (finally) sees it because John told her she should. Did Kelly like it? Not really! But after we discuss Nolan's take - which explores themes like PTSD, the morality of war, and Christian militarism - she liked it a little more! For this episode, we reference the following: The W.H.D. Rouse Translation of The Odyssey Emily Wilson's review of Nolan's film David French's NYT essay: Christopher Nolan Has Rebuked the Spirit of the Age Ezra Klein's NYT essay: Christopher Nolan's Trojan Horse
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    1 ora e 4 min
  • #063 - The Gospel According to Hobby Lobby with Michael Blanding

    #063 - The Gospel According to Hobby Lobby with Michael Blanding
    Jul 24 2026
    Journalist and author Michael Blanding's new book The Gospel According to Hobby Lobby tells the story of the billionaire Green family, whose commitment to right-wing Christian activism has touched every corner of modern American life. Blanding paints a thorough and fair portrait of the family, their motivations, and how they found themselves right in the middle of one of history's most expansive antiquities frauds. He joins Kelly and John to talk about how he came to the story of the Greens, what he makes of the Museum of the Bible, and what all this has to do with Chad Allen. You can find out more about Michael and his work at michaelblanding.com (Also, apologies for John's slightly wonky audio in the second half of this one!)
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    1 ora e 16 min
  • Football Is (The Way, The Truth, and The) Life! - World Cup Special

    Football Is (The Way, The Truth, and The) Life! - World Cup Special
    Jul 11 2026
    Football (or soccer if you want) like all sports has a religious dimension...and when it comes to the World Cup, the line between football and religion shrinks to the point of all-but-invisibility. We talk about how football is an and isn't a religion, the "Hand of God" 1986 and the sanctification of Diego Maradona, and how Brazilians blaming the national team's loss on Protestantism is actually a story to take seriously. For this episode, we looked at: The Convesation: Soccer and religion have more in common than you might think by Hanna Tervanotko America Magazine: The Church of Maradona: Understanding the left-wing saint of soccer by Ashley McKinless The Times: ‘If we pray like a gringo, then we play like a gringo’ by Stephen Gibbs
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    49 min