Quiverfull: Inside the Christian Patriarchy Movement


Kathryn Joyce - 2009
    Here, women live within stringently enforced doctrines of wifely submission and male headship, and live by the Quiverfull philosophy of letting God give them as many children as possible so as to win the religion and culture wars through demographic means.From the Trade Paperback edition.

The Golden Bough


James George Frazer - 1890
    The Golden Bough" describes our ancestors' primitive methods of worship, sex practices, strange rituals and festivals. Disproving the popular thought that primitive life was simple, this monumental survey shows that savage man was enmeshed in a tangle of magic, taboos, and superstitions. Revealed here is the evolution of man from savagery to civilization, from the modification of his weird and often bloodthirsty customs to the entry of lasting moral, ethical, and spiritual values.

Pure: Inside the Evangelical Movement That Shamed a Generation of Young Women and How I Broke Free


Linda Kay Klein - 2018
    Purity rings, purity pledges, and purity balls came with a dangerous message: girls are potential sexual “stumbling blocks” for boys and men, and any expression of a girl’s sexuality could reflect the corruption of her character. This message traumatized many girls—resulting in anxiety, fear, and experiences that mimicked the symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder—and trapped them in a cycle of shame. This is the sex education Linda Kay Klein grew up with. Fearing being marked a Jezebel, Klein broke up with her high school boyfriend because she thought God told her to, and took pregnancy tests though she was a virgin, terrified that any sexual activity would be punished with an out-of-wedlock pregnancy. When the youth pastor of her church was convicted of sexual enticement of a twelve-year-old girl, Klein began to question the purity-based sexual ethic. She contacted young women she knew, asking if they were coping with the same shame-induced issues she was. These intimate conversations developed into a twelve-year quest that took her across the country and into the lives of women raised in similar religious communities—a journey that facilitated her own healing and led her to churches that are seeking a new way to reconcile sexuality and spirituality. Sexual shame is by no means confined to evangelical culture; Pure is a powerful wake-up call about our society’s subjugation of women.

God Is Red: A Native View of Religion


Vine Deloria Jr. - 1972
    Celebrating three decades in publication with a special 30th-anniversary edition, this classic work reminds us to learn "that we are a part of nature, not a transcendent species with no responsibilities to the natural world." It is time again to listen to Vine Deloria Jr.'s powerful voice, telling us about religious life that is independent of Christianity and that reveres the interconnectedness of all living things.

The Rastafarians


Leonard E. Barrett Sr. - 1977
    Based on an extensive study of the Rastafarians, their history, their ideology, and their influence in Jamaica, The Rastafarians is an important contribution to the sociology of religion and to our knowledge of the variety of religious expressions that have grown up during the West African Diaspora in the Western Hemisphere.

Womanist Ethics and the Cultural Production of Evil


Emilie M. Townes - 2006
    Deconstructing memory, history, and myth as received wisdom, the volume critically examines racism, sexism, poverty, and stereotypes.

Sisters in Hate: American Women on the Front Lines of White Nationalism


Seyward Darby - 2020
    Trump, journalist Seyward Darby went looking for the women of the so-called alt-right--really just white nationalism with a new label. The mainstream media depicted the alt-right as a bastion of angry white men, but was it? As women headlined resistance to the Trump administration's bigotry and sexism, most notably at the women's marches, Darby wanted to know why others were joining a movement espousing racism and anti-feminism. Who were these women, and what did their activism reveal about America's past, present, and future? Darby researched dozens of women across the country before settling on three: Corinna Olsen, Ayla Stewart, and Lana Lokteff. Each was born in 1979 and became a white nationalist in the post-9/11 era. Their respective stories of radicalization upend much of what we assume about women, politics, and political extremism.

The Way of the Shaman


Michael Harner - 1980
    Ten years after it was first published, this is still the leading resource and reference for all those interested in cross-cultural and current forms of shamanism: now with a new introduction and a list of current shamanic resources.

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Wicca and Witchcraft


Denise Zimmermann - 2000
     € With the integration of witchcraft into pop culture (e.g. Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Charmed on TV) interest in these topics is going ever more mainstream € According to FoxNews.com, Wicca is growing on college campuses...Lehigh and the University

Midsummer: Rituals, Recipes & Lore for Litha


Deborah Blake - 2015
    A well-rounded introduction to Midsummer, this attractive book features rituals, recipes, lore, and correspondences. It includes hands-on information for modern celebrations, spells and divination, recipes and crafts, invocations and prayers, and more!

The Long Lost Friend: A 19th Century American Grimoire


John George Hohman - 1820
    A collection of herbal formulas and magical prayers, The Long-Lost Friend draws from the traditional folk magic of Pennsylvania Dutch customs and pow-wow healers.This is authentic American folk magic at its best--household remedies combined with charms and incantations to cure common ailments and settle rural troubles. The most well-known grimoire of the New World, this work has influenced the practices of hoodoo, Santeria, Paganism, and other faiths. In this, the definitive edition, you'll find:Both the original German text and the 1856 English translation More than one hundred additional charms and recipes, taken from the pirated 1837 Skippacksville edition and others Extensive notes on the recipes, magic, Pennsylvania Dutch customs, and the origin of many of the charms Indices for general purposes and ingredients Explanations of the specialized terminology of illnesses Whether your interest lies in folklore, ethnobotany, magic, witchcraft, or American history, this classic volume is an essential addition to your library.

Gospel Truth


Russell Shorto - 1997
    With the skill of a seasoned journalist and the passion of an amateur sleuth, he moves from scholarly conclave in California to archaeologcal digs in Israel, tracking down the story of the astounding consensus emerging from a varied group of experts.

The Evolution of God


Robert Wright - 2009
    Through the prisms of archaeology, theology, and evolutionary psychology, Wright's findings overturn basic assumptions about Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and are sure to cause controversy. He explains why spirituality has a role today, and why science, contrary to conventional wisdom, affirms the validity of the religious quest. And this previously unrecognized evolutionary logic points not toward continued religious extremism, but future harmony. Nearly a decade in the making, The Evolution of God is a breathtaking re-examination of the past, and a visionary look forward.

Wicca for Beginners: Fundamentals of Philosophy & Practice


Thea Sabin - 2006
    Rather than depending on snippets of wisdom to build a new faith, Wicca for Beginners provides a solid foundation to Wicca without limiting the reader to one tradition or path.Embracing both the spiritual and the practical, Wicca for Beginners is a primer on the philosophies, culture, and beliefs behind the religion, without losing the mystery that draws many students to want to learn. Detailing practices such as grounding, raising energy, visualization, and meditation, this book offers exercises for core techniques before launching into more complicated rituals and spellwork.Finalist for the Coalition of Visionary Resources Award for Best Wiccan/Pagan BookIn her first book-length work, Sabin presents a first-rate, fresh, and thorough addition to the burgeoning field of earth-based spiritual practice volumes...written in a light, informative style that magically mines depth, breadth and brevity.--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Cunning-Folk and Familiar Spirits: Shamanistic Visionary Traditions in Early Modern British Witchcraft and Magic


Emma Wilby - 2005
    Until recently historians often dismissed these descriptions as elaborate fictions created by judicial interrogators eager to find evidence of stereotypical pacts with the Devil. Although this paradigm is now routinely questioned, and most historians acknowledge that there was a folkloric component to familiar lore in the period, these beliefs and the experiences reportedly associated with them, remain substantially unexamined. Cunning-Folk and Familiar Spirits examines the folkloric roots of familiar lore from historical, anthropological and comparative religious perspectives. It argues that beliefs about witches' familiars were rooted in beliefs surrounding the use of fairy familiars by beneficent magical practitioners or 'cunning folk', and corroborates this through a comparative analysis of familiar beliefs found in traditional native American and Siberian shamanism. The author explores the experiential dimension of familiar lore by drawing parallels between early modern familiar encounters and visionary mysticism as it appears in both tribal shamanism and medieval European contemplative traditions. These perspectives challenge the reductionist view of popular magic in early modern British often presented by historians.