Some major announcements! We are now a proud partner of the Capps Center at UCSB! Capps is dedicated to ethics, religion, and public life in a way that matches up seamlessly with our approach on SWAJ. Check out their new series on indigenous religions!
We begin this episode by discussing the VP debate, particularly Mike Pence as a familiar type: The White Evangelical pastor.
We then discuss a cluster of issues surrounding science and COVID--Trump's use of medicines that made from aborted fetuses (a big deal to the Religious Right, supposedly), the New England Journal of Medicine's endorsement of Biden, and the general ignoring of scientific counsel on the part of the Trump administration.
We also analyze Senator Mike Lee's comments that democracy is not necessarily the best form of government--statements in line with Dominionist theology and part of what Brad calls "the dangerous allure of totalitarianism." The danger of these comments was brought into stark relief when news of a kidnapping plot against Governor Gretchen Whitmer emerged. While the major media outlets won't call it what it is, we will: this was an act of homegrown White terrorism and it is related to Trump's call to "liberate Michigan!"
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Axis Mundy Welcome to Straight White American Jesus.
My name is Brad Onishi, Associate Professor of Religious Studies, Skidmore College, and I'm here with my co-host.
I'm Dan Miller, Associate Professor of Religion and Social Thought at Landmark College.
It's nice to see you, Brad.
We didn't get to talk last week, so, you know, it's been a while, which in, like, Trump world means that 6,000 things have happened in the last, you know, couple weeks.
Yeah, we have not recorded together for two weeks, and that means we have missed approximately 7,000 to 8,000 stories.
One thing, it's your son's birthday, so thank you for your Father of the Year.
You got up super early, you're doing presents, and now you're out here being podcast for the year and recording with me, so thank you for being here.
Yeah, you gave me an excuse to play with Legos today instead of doing some real work that I needed to do, so it's an even trade-off, I think.
Yep, yep.
Well, we have a bunch of huge announcements we need to make, so friends, if you're listening, please, this is my time in class when I'm like, hey, I know you're not paying attention to me, so just listen up.
So that's what we're doing right now.
Three major announcements.
First, so excited, we are now an official partner with the Walter H. Kapp Center at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
So, Straight White American Jesus is now an affiliate of the Kapp Center.
The Kapp Center is dedicated to the study of ethics, religion, and public life.
Their director is Professor Greg Johnson and we've been talking with Greg and with the Center and we could not be more thrilled to just be affiliated with them.
If you are not familiar with the Kapp Center, check out their work.
They have a great series happening right now on Origin narratives and indigenous religions, indigenous cultures, and they just do amazing work.
I am, of course, a graduate of the University of California Santa Barbara Ph.D.
program, so for me, this is somewhat of a return home just to be able to work with them.
So we're excited, and you might be saying, well, hey Brad, that sounds great.
How do I check that out?
You can check that out on our brand new website, which is Straight White American Jesus.
It is finished.
We had a great developer, John A., who really helped us with that, so thanks to John A. And at StraightWhiteAmericanJesus.com, you will find all the information related to our show.
You'll find our series.
You'll find a dedicated page to the Orange Wave with transcripts, with bios, with suggested readings.
If you're a teacher, a professor, and you'd like to use the Orange Wave in your class, go to the website.
You'll find everything you need there.
You'll find pictures of Dan and I, which will be undoubtedly the worst part of the website, but you'll also find our bios, you'll find links to our YouTube channel, you'll find links to the CAP Center, and so on and so forth.
So we're very excited about it, and we hope you will go check that out very soon.
The last announcement, Dan, I'm going to throw to you here to explain, is on October 27, you're giving a public lecture at Landmark College on Christian nationalism.
So what are you going to talk about?
Yeah, so on October 27th, Landmark is a speaker series, and I'm the October speaker.
So it's just the 27th, if you sort of do the math, is not very long at all before the election.
I believe it's a week before the election.
And my talk is called Election 2020 and the Fantasy of a White Christian America.
A lot of the stuff that we've been talking about, A lot of the stuff that's in the book manuscript that I think is very close to being under agreement with the publisher now, so I'm excited about that, and I hope by then it will be.
So, yeah, it's a public talk.
We'll post links to it, but also if people just want to Google, if you Google Landmark College Speaker Series, it'll come up, and I think that mine, because it's the next one, is the first thing that comes up.
It's a virtual event, as you'd probably expect, so I will be sitting in my home office, I think, I'm recording this but there's a particular portal that they use but there's instructions there and people can log in and register and all that stuff so it is a public talk it'll also be recorded if people can't attend or participate on the 27th it'll be recorded I believe actually through like our local PBS station I think is who manages that but anyway
I'm excited about it if people are interested in sort of hearing more about that and some of the stuff I've been working on and again right before the election so I'm working on it now it might all be irrelevant in two weeks like depending you know who else gets COVID and like what else happens but Yeah, I'm really excited about it and invite people to check it out if they're interested.
Thanks for listening to this free preview of our Swag episode.
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