Method and Pedagogy in Religion and Popular Culture: Teaching With Implicit Theology and Secular Spirituality in Speculative Fictions

Speculative fictions provide common ground from which to explore questions related to religion, theology, and spirituality. In this session, we plan to outline and apply theoretical tools of implicit theology and secular spirituality that help students to negotiate new relationships among the unfamiliar and intersecting categories of theology and religious studies and of religion and popular culture. Paying special attention to the emotions elicited by particular operations within works of speculative fiction, we demonstrate how interaction with these fictions accomplishes implicit theological and secular spiritual work. After introducing our categories and methods, and describing the contemporary context(s) which invite their application, we will lead participants in hands-on work with specific examples (such as fiction by Octavia Butler and/or Ted Chiang and streaming series such as Severance and Midnight Mass) and invite evaluation of their utility in participants’ own contexts.