New Books in Christian Studies

Mar 09 2025 1479 ep. 54 mins 1.2k
New Books in Christian Studies Podcast artwork

Interviews with Scholars of Christianity about their New Books

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  Religion & Spirituality
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Kristin A. Olbertson, "The Dreadful Word: Speech Crime and Polite Gentlemen in Massachusetts, 1690–1776" (Cambridge UP, 2022)

Mar 09 2025 46 mins  
The Dreadful Word: Speech Crime and Polite Gentlemen in Massachusetts, 1690–1776 (Cambridge University Press, 2022) by Dr. Kristin Olbertson is the first comprehensive study of criminal speech in eighteenth-century New England, traces how the criminalization, prosecution, and punishment of speech offenses in Massachusetts helped to establish and legitimate a social and cultural r

Manu Pillai, "Gods, Guns and Missionaries: The Making of the Modern Hindu Identity" (Allen Lane, 2025)

Mar 06 2025 62 mins  
What is Hinduism? For centuries, that question was particularly thorny, both for local Indians and for colonial outsiders. People inside and outside the country tried to define what Hinduism was. Missionaries grappled with Hindu practices, finding both similarities and dangerous differences with their own Christian faith. The East India Company adopted several Hindu rituals to keep

Ellen Fenzel Arnold, "Medieval Riverscapes: Environment and Memory in Northwest Europe, C. 300-1100" (Cambridge UP, 2024)

Mar 01 2025 53 mins  
Jana Byars talks to Ellen Arnold about Medieval Riverscapes: Environment and Memory in Northwest Europe, 300 - 1100 (Cambridge UP, 2024). Fishermen, monks, saints, and dragons met in medieval riverscapes; their interactions reveal a rich and complex world. Using religious narrative sources to evaluate the environmental mentalities of medieval communities, Ellen F. Arnold explores t

Jeffrey Thomas Perry, "Law in American Meetinghouses: Church Discipline and Civil Authority in Kentucky, 1780–1845" (Johns Hopkins UP, 2022)

Feb 27 2025 45 mins  
Most Americans today would not think of their local church as a site for arbitration and would probably be hesitant to bring their property disputes, moral failings, or personal squabbles to their kin and neighbors for judgment. But from the Revolutionary Era through the mid-nineteenth century, many Protestants imbued local churches with immense authority. Through their ritual prac

Religious Freedom: A Conversation on the Conservative Tradition with John D. Wilsey

Feb 26 2025 45 mins  
In this conversation, we sit down with John D. Wilsey, Professor of Church History and Philosophy at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and Senior Fellow at the Center for Religion, Culture, and Democracy, to tackle the urgent and often contentious topic of religious freedom in America. Drawing from his forthcoming book, Religious Freedom: A Conservative Primer (William B. E

Bernard McGinn, "Modern Mystics: An Introduction" (Herder & Herder, 2023)

Feb 25 2025 104 mins  
Mysticism is not just a phenomenon of the past, but has been alive and flourishing in Chistianity, Judaism, and Islam over the past century, as well as in many of the other religious traditions. Best understood as a search for the transforming presence of God, the mystical tradition has necessarily undergone changes and developments as it has confronted modernity and its frequently

Words and Silences: The Thomas Merton Hermitage Tapes

Feb 24 2025 48 mins  
Brian Harnetty’s recent record, Words and Silences, takes voice recordings made by the famed American Trappist monk Thomas Merton and sets them within Harnetty’s musical compositions. The meditative and revealing result has been lauded by critics in The Wire, MOJO, and Aquarium Drunkard. In this episode, we share a Phantom Power exclusive: a brand new narrative piece that Bria

Sejong Chun, "Paul’s New Creation: Vision for a New World and Community" (Lexington Books, 2023)

Feb 23 2025 30 mins  
In Paul’s New Creation: Vision for a New World and Community (Lexington Book, 2023), Sejong Chun presents inter(con)textual readings of Paul’s new creation passages from the perspective of the Korean immigrant church in America. Chun focuses on Paul’s new creation’s cosmic dimension and ecclesiastical character and proposes the ekklēsia as a tangible embodiment. The author

Peter Ramey, "The Word-Hoard Beowulf: A Translation with Commentary" (Angelico Press, 2023)

Feb 22 2025 57 mins  
Beowulf is the product of a profoundly religious imagination, but the significance of the poem’s Christianity has been downplayed or denied altogether. The Word-Hoard Beowulf: A Translation with Commentary (Angelico Press, 2023) is the first translation and popular commentary to take seriously the religious dimension of this venerable text. While generations of students know that

Martyn Percy, "The Crisis of Colonial Anglicanism: Empire, Slavery and Revolt in the Church of England" (Hurst, 2025)

Feb 21 2025 49 mins  
The Crisis of Colonial Anglicanism: Empire, Slavery and Revolt in the Church of England (Hurst, 2025) by Dr. Martyn Percy offers a bold and unsettling truth: the British Empire and Great Britain are primarily English constructions, and the Church of England benefited from English enterprise and exploitation, serving as the spiritual arm of the imperial project. English Anglicanism