North Carolina Religious Studies Association
Annual Meeting October 31, 2026
Program

All meetings will be held in Sanford Hall on the campus of Appalachian State University.

8:30-9:00 - Check-In and Onsite Registration (102)

9:00-10:30 - Session 1A: Philosophy of Religion and Religious Experience (306)

• An Existential Deconstruction of Thomas Merton’s Early Season in New York, Paul Wilson (Shaw University)

• Leibniz's Principle of Sufficient Reason and the Philosophy of Religion, Brian Stratton (UNC Pembroke)

• Knowing from Within: William James and the Authority of Mystical Experience, Davontae Brewington (Appalachian State University)

• Chair: Adegoke Ademiluyi (Fayetteville State University)

9:00-10:30 - Session 1B: Religion, Technology, and Interpretation (312)

• Confucius Did Not 'Say...': Reflections on a Meme, Mathew Foust (Appalachian State University)

• The Social Construction of Religion: Three Philosophical Mistakes to Avoid,” Kevin Schilbrack (Appalachian State)

• The Capacity to Become Otherwise: An AI Ethics, Han Lheem (Fayetteville State University)

• Chair: Randy Reed (Appalachian State University)

10:45–12:15 - Session 2A: Religion, Health, Ecology, and Place (306)

• Faith, Health, and Healing: Developing an Interdisciplinary Minor for Culturally Competent Care, Paul Boaheng (Fayetteville State University)

• Spiritual Ecology, Conrad Ostwalt (Appalachian State University)

• Finding Nomadic Oasis: The Mount Shasta Community and Spiritual Identity through Mobile Placemaking, Sierra J. Sarver (Appalachian State University)

• Chair:  Paul Wilson (Shaw University)

10:45–12:15 - Session 2B: Religion and American Culture (312)

• Resistance Reimagined: Black Southern Cultural Gatherings Across Time, Space, and Belief in the United States, Chloé Griffin (University of North Carolina Chapel Hill)

• The Megaphone of Dayton: How Fundamentalist and Modernist Rhetorical Frameworks Were Codified Into the American Culture War, Samuel Carter (Appalachian State University)

• Do College Students Think the United States Was Founded as a Christian Nation?, Hannah Carlson (Appalachian State University)

• Chair: Randy Reed (Appalachian State University)

12:15-12:45 - Business Meeting/Award Presentations (102)

12:45-1:45 - Lunch (on your own)

1:45–3:15 - Session 3A: Ritual, Authority, and Gender (306)

• Waking the Dead: Clerical Authority, Keening, and the Contested Rituals of Nineteenth-Century Irish Deathways, Bradley Kadel (Fayetteville State University)

• From Deity to Dictator: A Comparative Study of the Charismatic Leader in Politics and Religion, Chloe Buchanan (North Carolina State University)

• One Flesh: Egalitarian Theology and Christ as the Liberator of Women, Emma-Rae Walker (Western Carolina University)

• Chair: Paul Boaheng (Fayetteville State University)

1:45–3:15 - Session 3B: Indigenous, Ancient, and African Religious Traditions (312)

• Bodies in the Architecture: Human Sacrifice and Monumentality at Cahokia’s Mound 72, Lucas White (Appalachian State University)

• The Practices of Religion, Custom and Tradition in Africa: The Case of Libation (Itu Mmai) among Igbo Ethnic Group in Southeastern Nigeria, Ngozi Kamalu (Fayetteville State University)

• The Place of Obatala in Yoruba Religion: Cosmology, Theology, and Religious Significance, Adegoke Ademiluyi & Kofi Johnson (Fayetteville State University)

• Chair: Paul Wilson (Shaw University)

3:20–4:40 - Session 4: Modernism and Imagination (306)

• Hymns of an Alien Mind,” Randy Reed (Appalachian State University)

• “No Reason We Can’t Make It True:” William Chamberlin and 1911 Modernism Controversy Among the Mormons, James McLachlan (Western Carolina University)

• Fictional Saints, Real Contexts, Vincent Cruz (Appalachian State University)

• Chair: John Brooks (Fayetteville State University)