When it comes to religion, the United States is indeed exceptional. Americans live in a society where they’re not only free from an established ‘state church,’ but where they have access to a unique never-ending marketplace of religious choice as well. America is the Walmart® of religious marketplaces, an industrial-sized superstore offering both foreign and domestic merchandise on a rotating basis. This seemingly boundless accessibility is the global exemplar of religious liberty, which also makes making sense of American religion a challenging process, for which there is no simple solution.

But it is doable. That will be our goal with this course. The path less traveled can seem foreign, odd, even ridiculous, but sometimes also enlightening, for it is in exploring the unorthodox, the heretical, the unconventional, where we might also find insights perhaps not previously considered. In discussing the less mainstream “items for sale” in the American religious marketplace, such as Mormonism, Scientology, and The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, we’re likewise granted the opportunity to see a more complete picture of American religion.

With this course, we will travel that path together, reading the sacred texts used by these religions, and engaging in lively discussions of their histories, their beliefs, and their role in American culture. Hopefully, in the process, we will discover why sometimes taking the path less traveled can make all the difference.