Is God but an objectified terminology for ordering the world in ranked form?  Can what the term “God” categorize come to mean the presence of power hither the human, beyond the human, or both inside and outside the human? Can there be religion without God or God without religion?  And on the question of suffering and moral progress, what role if any does the concept of God play in these particular projects of humans and the socialities in which we encounter them?  These are but some of the questions we will encounter and seek to engage.  Hence the course seeks to provide an opportunity not only to enter into learning more about the anthropology of religion, but also about the many other cultural spaces in which the discipline claims there appear such relevant issues as transcendence, sacredness, ecstasy, healing, ethics, and the seemingly absolute human requirement for the felt presence of the awe-inspiring.