Dr. Who is one of the longest running TV shows on the BBC, and it's got a huge fandom surrounding it, called Whovians. And while it might not seem like, Whovianism, might just be religion! Whovians, like other passionate fan cultures,...

Hans Rosling had a question: Do some religions have a higher birth rate than others -- and how does this affect global population growth? Speaking at the TEDxSummit in Doha, Qatar, he graphs data over time and across religions. With his...

Aliens - Are We Looking in the Wrong Place?

The ubiquitous yin-yang symbol holds its roots in Taoism/Daoism, a Chinese religion and philosophy. The yin, the dark swirl, is associated with shadows, femininity, and the trough of a wave; the yang, the light swirl, represents...

Today we’re going to talk about the collection of routes known as the Silk Roads, and explore how worldview and other ideas spread along those trade routes. The Silk Roads are responsible for everything from the spices we use when we...

African artifacts shown in museums worldwide are often not borrowed, but stolen -- and TED Fellow Jim Chuchu is on a mission to get them back. Learn the sordid history behind how many of the collections in the West came to be, Chuchu's...

Today we’re turning our sociological eye to another major social institution: religion. We’ll use symbolic interactionism to help us understand the dichotomy of the Sacred vs. the Profane. We’ll compare the perspectives of structural...

Paul Solman talks with author Robert Putnam about his new book "American Grace," which delves into the role of religion in the United States.

It's perfectly human to grapple with questions, like 'Where do we come from?' and 'How do I live a life of meaning?' These existential questions are central to the five major world religions -- and that's not all that connects these...

Germany guarantees its people the freedom to practice the religion of their choice; there is no state religion. Protestant and Catholic churches have enjoyed equal status in Germany for centuries. The Peace of Augsburg in 1555 recognized...

Singapore is a secular state, and people of all religions are free to worship. This history of religious tolerance dates back to a time when traders, immigrants, and conquerors introduced the islanders to their religions. Over the...

Welcome to Crash Course Religions! Over the next 24 episodes, John Green will explore the history and culture of religions and how they offer frameworks for making sense of our lives — while being incredibly slippery things to pin down....

When is yoga religious, and when is it… not religious enough? In this episode of Crash Course Religions, we’ll find out why these frameworks we call “religions” are so hard to define, and why our definitions have real-life consequences.

When we think of world religions, we often think of the Big Five: Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism. But why do we think of those? In this episode of Crash Course Religions, we’ll learn why “world religions” is a...

What is a cult? How are cults different from religions? And why do many religious scholars say we shouldn’t even use that label? In this episode of Crash Course Religions, we’ll learn why the line between cults and religions is much...

The word “magic” has dubious, demonic connotations. But is there really a difference between magic and religion? In this episode of Crash Course Religions, we’ll explore the history of magical practices and discover how modern-day...

Sacred texts mean different things to different religions—sometimes they’re essential to belief and practice, and other times, not much importance is placed on them at all. In this episode of Crash Course Religions, we dive into the...

From priests to imams, from rabbis to gurus, religious leaders play a big role in shaping religions today. In this episode of Crash Course Religions, we’ll dig into what makes a religious leader and how people can take the power back.

Everybody dies—and then what? In this episode of Crash Crash Religions, we’ll explore how religions around the world have formed answers to a question nobody knows the answer to. We’ll also discover how concepts of Heaven and Hell have...

Angels, aliens, and ghosts—oh my! In this episode of Crash Course Religions, we figure out how the paranormal and supernatural shows up in our religions, and outside of them. If you or someone you know identifies as “spiritual but not...

Religion and science have had some famously messy fights, but do they always have to be in conflict? In this episode of Crash Course Religions, we’ll look at some ways religion and science are more than just enemies.

It’s the end of the world as we know it. Or is it? In this episode of Crash Course Religions, we explore end-of-the-world predictions across time and faith traditions. It turns out that, more often than not, those predictions have been...

Is Star Wars a religion? What about belief in UFOs or QAnon? In our final episode of Crash Course Religions, we’ll explore how religion shapes pop culture, and pop culture shapes religion right back.

Howcast - Learn about the biblical figure Abraham in this Howcast Bible study video with Reverend Dr. Timothy Coombs.