University of Chicago Divinity School

06/04/2026

"Quick: name the most accomplished fictional scholar to teach at Swift Hall."

The new edition of 'Criteria' is out, and if you read one thing this week, make it Will Schultz's reflection on Martin Gardner, 'The Flight of Peter Fromm,' and what Swift Hall has meant to American religious history.

It starts with a trivia question about the most accomplished fictional scholar ever to teach here. It ends somewhere much more personal.

https://divinity.uchicago.edu/news/flight-american-christianity

06/02/2026

Every spring, the Undergraduate Program in Religious Studies gathers to celebrate students at UChicago College who've spent a year doing genuinely original work in religious studies. This year's symposium featured thesis presentations from graduating seniors, and the chance to honor two students who stood out even among that exceptional group. Congratulations to Eva Fajardo (Jonathan Z. Smith Award) and Alyssa Manthi (Anne Carr Memorial Award).

05/28/2026

What if your syllabus said: play this.

At The University of Chicago, Divinity School instructor Marshall Cunningham has built an undergraduate course called "Gaming the Gods: Video Games and Religion," around exactly that premise. Students play Journey, Halo, Cult of the Lamb, and more, not for fun (well, not only for fun), but as primary texts for analyzing religious symbolism, ritual practice, and belief systems.
Cunningham hasn't played a video game in years. That's the point. Students bring the gaming expertise. He brings the critical religious studies lens. Together, they read a video game the way you'd read a poem aloud in class: slowly, carefully, stopping to notice what you'd normally run past.

"I feel like I'm really learning how to closely read different works of media," said Rafaela Grieco-Freeman, a third-year student. "I've never been able to look at video games with such a critical eye before."

Read the full story →

In ‘Gaming the Gods,’ UChicago undergrads use video games as primary texts to understand religious symbolism and ritual practice

05/28/2026

“Perhaps most intriguing for assessing the religious character of the Don Colossus is Burns’s attempts to differentiate ‘honor’ from ‘worship.’ The distinction echoes ancient Christian defenses of icons and other forms of material worship.” - Nathan J. Hardy, Sightings, May 28, 2026

In this week's Sightings essay for The Marty Center, Nathan J. Hardy explores how defenders of Trump’s golden statue echo Christian arguments on relics and icons, framing political devotion as saintly honor. Read more via https://ow.ly/K61v50Z5eFk

05/26/2026

Congratulations to Professor Kirsten Macfarlane, recipient of the Rare Book School 2026 SoFCB Best Essay Award from the Andrew W. Mellon Society of Fellows in Critical Bibliography.

Her prize-winning article in the Journal of the History of Ideas explores how mysterious characters from medieval Jewish manuscripts were reinterpreted by early modern Christians as angelic, celestial alphabets—and how those ideas came to trouble orthodox theological understandings of angels and knowledge itself.

05/22/2026

What does intellectual honesty look like in practice? For Tommaso Bacci, a fifth-year PhD student at the Div School, it sounds like faculty saying—openly, without apology—"I don't know. Let's find out together."

In his Field Notes dispatch, Bacci reflects on how that posture shapes the culture of Swift Hall and why embracing uncertainty may be one of graduate study's most enduring lessons.

Watch now: https://youtu.be/Yn-C5ijXqKQ?si=-8FgN2Wc4guIjVP2

05/21/2026

“To the extent that Hollywood movies offer us a 'degraded mythology,' in [Wendy] Doniger’s words, it has less to do with the medium of cinema and more with studios’ desires to sell Lego sets and chicken nuggets.” - Russell P. Johnson Sightings, May 21, 2026

In this week's Sightings essay for The Marty Center, Russell P. Johnson examines how the Star Wars movies offer a spirituality that resonates with many religious believers, but there are downsides to studios being in the mythmaking business. Read more via https://ow.ly/4zKi50Z2SyZ

05/20/2026

Swift Hall has a button in its elevator for a floor that doesn't exist—floor "2M"—rumored by some to afford access to the Pure Land of the Buddha Amitābha.

It also has a room whose heating has never quite worked, a portrait of Wendy Doniger that brightens the whole building, and a third-floor lecture hall whose angels have watched over more Gifford Lecturers than anywhere else on earth.

For Swift Hall's centennial, Dan Arnold, John Henry Barrows Professor of the Philosophy of Religions, reflects on what it means to have called one building home for longer than any other.

Read "A Place Like No Other" here: https://divinity.uchicago.edu/news/place-no-other

05/20/2026

Congratulations to Assistant Instructional Professor Russell Johnson, recipient of the Glenn and Claire Swogger Award for Exemplary Classroom Teaching! 🎓

Professor Johnson brings a background in improv comedy to the philosophy and religion classroom, and his students feel the difference. His goal: for students to use their imagination as much as their reason, because true understanding requires both.

The Div School couldn't be prouder. Full story at the link below.
🔗 divinity.uchicago.edu/news/if-then-what-russell-johnson-wins-swogger-award-classroom-teaching