Holy Watermelon

Totalitarian control is popular in religious groups. Zinnia escaped the Christadelphian church a few years back, and now she hosts a podcast (Life After Leaving) all about supporting ex-Christadelphians to tell their stories and find support.  Zinnia tells us about the history of the movement, from the magazine-selling origins of John Thomas, who finally named his cult to get conscientious objecto...

Previously a Patreon Exclusive episode: We're opening the vault to showcase some of our older subscriber content. For the first time, Katie reads the Torah (The Pentateuch, or Five Books of Moses), the first chunk of the Hebrew Bible (AKA Old Testament). Join us for this sacred journey through the most significant books in all of human history--according to the western perspective. The Torah inclu...

Is belief a choice, or are our beliefs inherent to us? How do we decide whether something is true or not? With more than 8 billion people on the planet, there are about 10,000 different types of religious beliefs. How do we come to our conclusions?  Epistemology is a complex area of philosophy that deals with how we process information and decide if something is fact or fiction.  We explore the di...

Martin Luther is a hero to countless Christians around the world. The birth of European Protestantism and the Lutheran Church cannot be expressed without citing the 95 theses that Martin Luther posted to the church door on Halloween 1517. A diet of worms follows. Whether you want to celebrate Fred the Wise or Pope Leo X, big changes came to Western Christendom because of Martin Luther's refusal to...

Tasawwuf is the old word for dressing in wool, the typical identifier for a monk, ascetic, and mystic. Today, we pronounce it Sufi. The Sufi tradition dates back to the foundation of Islam, though both adherents and opponents have claimed that it's even older than Islam--certainly some of the ideas are.... The Goal is Tawhid, the perfect union with Allah (the God of the Hebrew Bible). The Prophet...

Christian mysticism is widely spread through this relatively common but fairly new tradition derived almost exclusively from what might have been parody pamphlets that told the story of Christian Rosenkreuz. Johann Valentine Andrea claims to have written one such pamphlet to make fun of the growing interest in mystical and magical traditions shortly after the beginning of protestant era in Germany...

Kabbalah isn't just another branch of Judaism--it's more mystical and personal. The idea is hat you really connect with the creator of the universe--but if you fail at that, there's always another shot with the benefits of reincarnation. Mystical concerns include finding hidden meaning (often in places where it ought not to be) through astrology or gematria (numerology). The Zohar adds depth to th...

Over millennia, countless dietary traditions have formed around the world; many are tied strictly to religious traditions, and have thereby been empowered to stand the test of time (with some scientific speculation). We examine the details that outline kosher food, and how it's much stricter than halal diets (which are hardly monolithic). We also look at the Christian narrative that discards the K...

Mina Angotti has a Master's degree in theology, focusing her studies on Mary, the Mother of Christ. Mina is a longtime friend of the show, and a devout Catholic. She's here to tell us about the details of the Nativity deduced  from history, combined with a fundamentalist understanding of the Biblical source material.  Learn about the shepherds and the magicians, the census and the cave, the faith...

Vatileaks (or Vatican Document Leaks) caused a lot of trouble in Rome in 2012, leading directly (allegedly) to the Pope abdicating his office for the first time in centuries. Paolo Gabriele (papal butler) snuck documents to GianLuigi Nuzzi (Italian journalist) to expose the corruption of Archbishop Carlo Mario Vigano. The Holy See was burying sex scandals, bribery, home invasions, and overpriced h...

Daoism (formerly called Taosim) is the more prominent indigenous religion of China. Daoism incorporates philosophical writings from ancient scholars, and mystic divination based on a variety of fascinating methods. The Dao-de-jing (or Tao Te Ching) is one of the most famous classics, along with the Yi Jing (I Ching). In this episode we explore the mysterious figure of Laozi (Lao Tsu), and the comp...

Shoko Asahara (born Chizuo Matsumoto) led a modest cultus that grew rapidly beyond the borders of its native Japan.  A blind acupuncturist,  Asahara was convicted of selling pharmaceuticals illegally before he decided to sell people faith instead. Asahara studied many religious traditions before concocting one of his own that would appeal to the people around him, AUM Shinrikyo , and he got people...

Literature is full of doomsday cults, but the real world is much more chilling. This week we explore the Great Green Arkleseizure, the Cthulhu mythos, and the many gods described in the works of Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett.  Douglas Adams' approach to popular culture brought us a fantastic new version of pious deism.  H. P. Lovecraft brought us a horrifying collection of chaotic gods that migh...

Hoodoo is a terribly syncretic religion, developed as a sibling to Voodoo (and there are other siblings in this family, too).  Magickcrafts have been traded for as long as people have been trading spices and weapons, and Hoodoo Conjurers have collected a fantastic variety of tools from their neighbors. There's a lot to learn when you're genuinely interested in improving your craft. Herbalism, incl...

Keith Raniere is the object of worship in the NXIVM cult, a god in the plainest sense of the word. The founder of a few MLMs, this guy knew how to make a fortune from people who turned out to be easy to manipulate. From collecting voluntary celebrities and multi-millionaires to veritable human trafficking,  NXIVM started out looking like a simple self-help group with a complicated oath and patent,...

New Age religion is a lot more than a scheme to sell books and crystals, it's a belief that a new age of enlightenment is dawning--or did so centuries ago--or is centuries away. It might be something to fear, or something to celebrate. Astrology is all trash, and we're happy to point out the best reasons why. But, it can also be wholesome entertainment. The people who make your star charts don't c...

Latin  America has managed to preserve some of its pre-Columbian religious heritage, so we're going to explore the traditions of the Olmec, Maya, Aztec, and Inca nations.  We explore cocaine, purification rituals, human sacrifice, gods from throughout history, and Catholic syncretism.  All this and more....   Support us on Patreon or you can get our merch at Spreadshop .  Join the Community on Dis...

It's time to take another look at religion in popular culture, in particular, cults in film, and why we love telling these stories. The Wicker Man (Either Christopher Lee's 1973 classic, or Nicolas Cage's 2006 remake) is a fantastic story about a man trying to save a girl who doesn't want to be saved from the cult of her little island town. The Ritual  (2017) takes some liberties with Norse pagani...

Dr. Sean Hannan did his post-graduate studies at the University of Chicago before joining the faculty of MacEwan University in Edmonton Alberta. His studies revolve around St. Augustine of Hippo, and the medieval mystics like Meister Eckhart von Hochheim. Augustine of Hippo was a profoundly significant character in the development of early Christian theology. It is said that (since Augustine was A...

After ragging on people who surely don't deserve the veneration they receive from faithful Christians around the world, for their questionable morality, or even dubious historicity, it's time for us to look at a heptad of saints who are genuinely good role models--at least on the surface.... For these saints (as opposed to Teresa of Calcutta), poverty was an obstacle to be overcome, rather than a...

The Church of Rome doesn't represent all of Christianity, but it is a major portion of the global population, so it's time for us to look at their foundation, and what makes them distinct from other groups.  We explore the history of the Catholic Church, including the history of apostolic codenames, and the trouble with apostolic succession. The long history of Anti-Popes and "Lucky" Popes is fasc...

Gods of the underworld are not the same as gods of death, nor are the guides the same--not even the Grim Reaper. Hades is the minder of the subterrestrial realm, just as Zeus and Poseidon are the minders of the Mountain (... and the sky) and the Sea (tough to argue for pluralizing those realms).  Pluto is the same figure, adopted by the Romans AFTER he got his new stage-name.  Osiris is the keeper...

Religious clothing is as varied as any other kind of fashion, but there are a few common themes that we will highlight: Chastity is encouraged in modesty, and it's weird that covering your hair is more important that loose-fitting tops; weirder still when covering your hair with more hair has religious pressure on the cultural misstep. Fancy hats are everywhere, in a wide variety of styles remind...

If sin were ugly, the world would be a paradise. Sin has a lot of faces in religious traditions around the world, some more consequential than others.  Hamartiology is the study of sin, and it looks like some folk only want to define the line so they know how close they can stand. Sin is simply the misstep or error that divides people. Some people are more interested in listing sins than in unitin...

What is a church? How does a religious society really differentiate itself from any other kind of society? What does it take to become a priest of the Holy Watermelon? Some people join self-help groups without realizing they've been trapped in a cult. We'll be up front about it: this is a church. How can we be a church while also being secular and academic? Easy, the rules that define religion are...