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153517 results in Religion

Page 103 of 7676

  • Turning to Christ, Communicating with the Roman Gods: Interpretatio Christiana and “Christian Polytheism” in the Early Roman Empire

  • Richard Last
  • Journal:
    Harvard Theological Review / Volume 119 / Issue 1 / January 2026
    Published online by Cambridge University Press:
    30 March 2026, pp. 69-91
    Print publication:
    January 2026
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  • While Paul urged practitioners of Christ-worship to abandon their old gods and replace them with Christ—a demand later re-issued by Justin, Tertullian, and other spokespersons—this study suggests that such an “abandon and replace” ideal would not normally have been followed. Relinquishing old gods when turning to Christ posed risks compared to other methods of embracing new gods. Furthermore, in antiquity, abandoning old gods was neither necessary nor common upon adoption of new deities. In light of these observations, my study highlights underexplored modes of embracing Christ in the Roman principate, and argues that a plurality of Christ-followers maintained connections with the Roman gods. I suggest that interpretatio Christiana and various other forms of adding Christ to existing religious practices were likely embraced by a prominent number of Christ-followers prior to Constantine.

The Pope and the pill
  • Sex, Catholicism and women in post- war England
  • David Geiringer
  • Published by:
    Manchester University Press
    Published online:
    23 December 2025
  • On 25 July 1968, Pope Paul VI shook the world. His encyclical letter Humanae Vitae rejected widespread calls to permit use of the contraceptive pill and deemed artificial contraception ‘intrinsically evil’. The Catholic Church is now commonly identified as the antagonist in a story of sixties sexual revolution – a stubborn stone resisting the stream of sex-positive modernity. There has been little consideration of how Catholic women themselves experienced this period of cultural upheaval. This book is about the sexual and religious lives of Catholic women in post-war England. It uses original oral history material to uncover the way Catholic women negotiated spiritual and sexual demands at a moment when the two increasingly seemed at odds with one another. The book also examines the public pronouncements and secretive internal documents of the central Catholic Church, offering a ground-breaking new explanation of the Pope’s decision to prohibit the pill. The materials gathered here provide a fresh perspective on the idea that ‘sex killed God’, reframing dominant approaches to the histories of sex, religion and modernity. The memories of Catholic women help us understand why religious belief does not structure the lives of most English men and women today in the way it did at the close of the Second World War, why sex holds a place of such significance in our modern culture, and crucially, how these two developments related to one another. The book will be essential reading for not only scholars of sexuality, religion, gender and oral history, but anyone interested in post-war social change.

  • 2 - The Catholic Church’s understanding of female sexuality

  • David Geiringer
  • Book:
    The Pope and the pill
    Published by:
    Manchester University Press
    Published online:
    23 December 2025, pp 46-65

  • Summary

    This chapter explores the relationship between the Catholic Church and ‘sexual liberation’ via the subject of female sexuality. It looks at the way female sexuality was understood in public and private discussions within the Church during the post-war decades, notably Pope Paul VI’s rejection (Humanae Vitae, 1968) of the Papal Commission for Birth Control’s suggestion to overturn the Church’s prohibition of contraception. It uses the unpublished papers of papal commission member John Marshall (the author’s grandfather) to document the it debates and discussions that led to Humanae Vitae. It demonstrates that, contrary to popular belief, HV was not simply the failing of ‘conservative’ opponents of change, but was also written into the way ‘liberal’ commission members approached female sexuality. At no point in the commission’s discussions were ‘ordinary’ Catholic women asked to speak about their sexual experiences. The chapter argues that a conceptual divide between the religious and the sexual underpinned both Humanae Vitae and the ‘liberal’ case for change.

  • 1 - Uncovering the sex lives of Catholic women

  • David Geiringer
  • Book:
    The Pope and the pill
    Published by:
    Manchester University Press
    Published online:
    23 December 2025, pp 26-45

  • Summary

    This chapter discusses the sources, methods and approach that are used in the book. It begins by outlining the significance of the ‘personal’ for the study. I speak about my own religious, sexual and familial background and the effect this has had on the project. I argue that an open, reflexive approach places the reader in a privileged position from which to evaluate the testimony of the interviewees. A new Catholic-feminist methodology is advanced which emphasises the need to take Catholic women seriously as authors of their own life stories. The chapter then moves on to offer important information about the way the oral history material was gathered. In this section of the chapter, how the interviewees were recruited, the interview process and the question of ‘representivity’ are addressed. It argues that rather than seeing the subjective nature of spoken testimony as a limitation, it is this very attribute which can help reframe understandings of ‘the personal’ within Catholicism.

Page 103 of 7676