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194: The Power Worshippers (w/Katherine Stewart)

194: The Power Worshippers (w/Katherine Stewart)

FromConspirituality


194: The Power Worshippers (w/Katherine Stewart)

FromConspirituality

ratings:
Length:
71 minutes
Released:
Feb 22, 2024
Format:
Podcast episode

Description

January 6, 2021. MAGA hats, tactical gear, American flags, poles turned into clubs. Another flag appears: white, with a blue corner square containing a red Latin cross. Another that proclaims “Jesus is King.”
If you’re agnostic or atheist, you might get that old familiar feeling. Horror at the irrational devotion, nausea at the toxic masculine violence that justifies itself as holy. 
But what if you recognize that Protestant flag from your own church sanctuary? What if you recognize in that mob people from your church choir? Will you wonder how their faith was replaced by conspiracy theories, and how their Jesus turned into Trump? 
That’s the question posed by “God & Country,” a new documentary by Dan Partland and produced by Rob Reiner, based on the book The Power Worshippers by Katherine Stewart. Stewart is an investigative reporter and author who has covered religious liberty, politics, policy, and education for over a decade. Her journalism appears in the NY Times, NBC, the New Republic, and the New York Review of Books. She joins us today to discuss the dangers of growing Christian Nationalism in America.
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Released:
Feb 22, 2024
Format:
Podcast episode

Titles in the series (100)

A weekly study of converging right-wing conspiracy theories and faux-progressive wellness utopianism. At best, the conspirituality movement attacks public health efforts in times of crisis. At worst, it fronts and recruits for the fever-dream of QAnon. As the alt-right and New Age horseshoe toward each other in a blur of disinformation, clear discourse and good intentions get smothered. Charismatic influencers exploit their followers by co-opting conspiracy theories on a spectrum of intensity ranging from vaccines to child trafficking. In the process, spiritual beliefs that have nurtured creativity and meaning are transforming into memes of a quickly-globalizing paranoia. Conspirituality Podcast attempts to bring understanding to this landscape. A journalist, a cult researcher, and a philosophical skeptic discuss the stories, cognitive dissonances, and cultic dynamics tearing through the yoga, wellness, and new spirituality worlds. Mainstream outlets have noticed the problem. We crowd-source, research, analyze, and dream answers to it.