Sightings Articles
Enlightenment Religion in the Private and Public Bibles of Thomas Jefferson
For Thomas Jefferson, the human being's responsibility was to extricate and celebrate good religion....
February 29, 2024
The Cardinal and His Popes
The tension between Cardinal Burke and Pope Francis offers a window into the state of Roman Catholicism in the world and American religion....
December 13, 2023
“The Higher Law”: Tracing the Color Lines with Charles Chesnutt
Charles Chesnutt’s novel "The Marrow of Tradition" indexes the ongoing persistence of racism and the recourse to a color-blind “higher law” based putatively on ability rather than race....
October 19, 2023
Redefining Redlining on Chicago’s Southside
The tulips in Amanda Williams' art installation enact for residents who live in or pass through the area that tenacious double effect of urban redlining: the mark of the past is never entirely erased....
June 15, 2023
Oedipus Then and Again … And Again
Pasolini’s Edipo Re reminds us of the boldness at the heart of humanistic learning: the conviction that the texts we decide to study should matter not just for us but for anyone. ...
March 9, 2023
Papal Fallibility
Commentary prompted by the recent death of emeritus Pope Benedict XVI unsurprisingly indexes the usual binaries of sensationalized speculation. ...
January 4, 2023
(Not) Doing It for the Money
The American educational system and religion are more closely tied to economics than is readily acknowledged....
October 13, 2022
Partisanship in Religion and Politics
Many lament the obliteration of bipartisan politics: too few acknowledge it as a casualty of the idea that America is a "Christian nation"....
May 25, 2022
The Return of Franz Bibfeldt
Bibfeldt’s return invites us to remember that there is an essential place for the occasional fit of laughter in even the most scholarly house....
April 6, 2022
The Christian Who Was a Church of One
In a world that seems to me to offer precious little of the mantle of prophecy, I offer you William Blake....