An impressionistic ’70s-vintage documentary on the art of Betye Saar, whose assemblage shadow boxes, mixed-media sculptures and altars frequently evoke a kind of syncretic Black mysticism.
God is Change.Shape God.The Destiny of Earthseed is to take root among the stars. Click here to visit the Earthseed website, home of one of several new religions inspired by speculative fiction author Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower (1993) and Parable of the Talents (1998): Most religions are ultimately cargo cults. Adherents perform required … Read moreEarthseed: a new religion inspired by Octavia Butler’s “Parable” series
Molly Birnbaum writes for Topic on the Trump-era revival of W.I.T.C.H. as a tactic of political protest and occult resistance: “Anonymity is dramatic,” says a W.I.T.C.H. (Anonymity also prevents doxxing—a real threat in this day and age.) “The witch is a powerful figure when so many people feel like they’re losing control,” another W.I.T.C.H. explains. … Read more“W.I.T.C.H.es Brew” (2017)
Pioneering American neo-Druid Isaac Bonewits first published the ADCDEF in the second edition of his book Real Magic, in the midst of a widespread and sometimes justified moral panic about new/minority religions. As Bonewits commented, many years after its original publication: Minority groups, especially religious ones, are often accused of crimes by members of the … Read more“The Advanced Bonewits Cult Danger Evaluation Frame” (1979)
YouTuber The Middle Man explains the religion of Mithraism as fictionalized in the TV series Raised by Wolves. In the series, a reconstruction or revival of the ancient Roman mystery cult of Mithraism quickly gains religious (and then political and military) hegemony during the 22nd century, due largely to its use of a new technology … Read moreThe Mithraic Religion in “Raised by Wolves”
Moderator Aaron Grizzell (MA, executive director, Northern California Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Foundation) leads a discussion on the relationships between Afrofuturism and Black religion with panelists John Jennings (MFA: professor of Media and Cultural Studies, UC Riverside 2-time Eisner Award winner (2016, 2018), Kinitra D. Brooks (PhD: Leslie Endowed Chair of Literary Studies, … Read more“Afro-Futurism and Black Religion: Connecting Imaginations” (Comic-Con 2020)
Click here to read the English translation of the Bibliothèque nationale de France’s take on faith and fantasy: The issue of mortality and immortality is a favorite with fantasy authors, who explore the influence and issues at stake in the passage of time, as well as the concept of free will and fate (The Wheel … Read more“Faith and Religion in Fantasy Societies”
Originally published in England in 1926, The Gates of Horn is a mock-epistolary anthology of poems and faery stories by Bernard Sleigh (1872-1954). A talented artist in several media, Sleigh is best known today as the creator of An Ancient Mappe of Fairyland, Newly Discovered and Set Forth (1917); a scan of the entire Mappe … Read more“The Gates of Horn: Being Sundry Records From the Proceedings of the Society for the Investigation of Faery Fact and Fallacy”
In this 2018 report, Satanic Temple co-founder Lucien Greaves observes that: I think if most Christians are honest about it, I think they’ll admit that they’re just pretty much picking and choosing what they will believe and what they won’t. I think that the more people become comfortable culturally identifying with their religions and realizing … Read more“The Satanic Temple’s Protest for First Amendment Rights”
Artist/scholar/witchdoctor M. Dudeck offers a concise precis of his massive RELIGIONVIR.US project, a queer science fiction religion. In this video montage, Dudeck and his collaborators enact aspects of PSALMS: a 45-minute music-centered performance featuring 13 invented psalms accompanied by a complex digital soundscore and projected video.