Michigan State University

Arts and Letters College Directory

Morgan Shipley

  • (He/Him)
  • Department Chairperson, Foglio Endowed Chair of Spirituality
  • Religious Studies
Biography

Morgan Shipley (Ph.D.) is the Inaugural Foglio Endowed Chair of Spirituality and Chairperson for the Department of Religious Studies at Michigan State University.  With a particular interest in how spirituality overlaps with compassionate modes of being and efforts to enhance human well-being and flourishing among people who self-identify as nonreligious or spiritual but not religious, Dr. Shipley’s research focuses on the nature of contemporary spirituality, specifically as the ways humans orient themselves to questions of meaning, purpose, and belonging.

His first monograph, Psychedelic Mysticism: Transforming Consciousness, Religious Experiences, and Voluntary Peasants in Postwar America (Lexington Books, November 2015), critically re-focuses how we understand the relationship between psychedelic exploration, mystical consciousness, and projects of social change in postwar America by highlighting the nature and expression of new spiritualities actualized through justice movements and political transformation.

Dr. Shipley is currently finalized two research projects and just initiating a third.

The first, Spirituality: The Basics (Routledge, expected late 2026), offers an accessible and nuanced guide to the diverse ways spirituality is expressed and practiced today. Moving beyond rigid definitions and reductive views that treat spirituality as merely a byproduct of religion or a purely inward pursuit, the book invites readers to explore how spirituality operates across secular and nonreligious contexts. In these spaces, it functions as a vital resource for orienting people in their search for purpose, meaning, and belonging.

The second, Transcendentalism Now! (Fortress Press, expected early 2028), is a co-written manuscript that provides an original reading of Transcendentalists, specifically in relation to what the movement signified within its historical moment and how it connects to the development and machinations of contemporary neoliberalism. This book reassesses the unsettled cultural legacy of Transcendentalism by placing many of its dominant voices into conversation with the concerns of the present, including the pressing climate crisis and commodification of spirituality. Even as this project problematizes orthodox readings of the Transcendentalists, it also recovers a useful Transcendentalism: a site of respite and refuge for our traumatic times.

The third manuscript, Lessons in Spiritual Care: Father Jake Foglio and a Legacy of Love, draws from the work of Father Jake Foglio to explore the application of spirituality within healthcare, student leadership and mentoring, and traditional religious settings. Research, developed, and co-written with two MSU undergraduate students, an additional component of this project is collating and annotating Father Jake’s teaching material to be added to the MSU Library.

Works

Manuscripts

Psychedelic Mysticism: Transforming Consciousness, Religious Experiences, and Voluntary Peasants in Postwar America (Lexington Books, Rowman & Littlefield, 2015)

Spirituality: The Basics (Routledge, expected late 2026)

Transcendentalism Now!, Co-written with Dr. Michael J. Blouin (Fortress Press, expected late 2027)

Peer-reviewed Journal Editorship:

Guest Editor, “Cluster: Teaching Transcendentally,” The Concord Saunterer 32 (2024)

Special Issue Guest Editor, “Special Issue: Whither Spirituality?,” Religions (2024)

Special Issue Editor, “Special Issue: Environmental Radicalisms,” Journal for the Study of Radicalism 17.2 (2023)

Special Issue Guest Editor, “Special Issue: 21st Century Religion(s) and Spiritualities,” CR: The New Centennial Review 22.2 (Fall 2022)

Select Peer-reviewed Journal Articles:

“Spirituality as Reciprocal Responsibility: A Transcendentalist Pedagogy,” Cluster: Teaching Transcendentally, The Concord Saunterer 32 (2024): 156-169

“From Kaleidoscopes to Phantasmagoria: The Shifting Nature(s) of Religion and Spirituality in the 21st Century,” Special Issue: 21st Century Religion(s) and Spiritualities, CR: The New Centennial  Review 22.2 (Fall 2022): 1-6

“‘How Does Nature Deify Us’: Disney, Climate Change, and the Worship of the Self,” Co-written with Dr. Michael J. Blouin, Special Issue: 21st Century Religion(s) and Spiritualities, CR: The New Centennial Review 22.2 (Fall 2022): 161-204

“Apocalyptic Redemption and Utopian Resignation: How Visions of Dystopia Made Community Impossible in Jonestown,” Communal Societies, Special Issue: Jonestown 40th Anniversary Retrospective 38.2 (2019): 135-160

“‘A Critique of Culture:’ Alan Watts, Psychedelic Buddhism, and Religious Play in Postwar America,” Invited Contributor for Special Issue of Self and Society: Journal of the Association for Humanistic Psychology 45.3-4 (2017): 233-243

“‘This Season’s People:’ Stephen Gaskin, Psychedelic Religion, and a Community of Social Justice,” Journal for  the Study of Radicalism 9.2 (2015): 41-92

“‘A Necessary but Not Sufficient Condition:’ Psychedelic Mysticism, Perennial Liminality, and the Limits of Supernatural Theism,” Preternature: Critical and Historical Studies on the Preternatural 3.2 (2014): 367-400

“Hippies and the Mystic Way: Dropping-Out, Unitive Experiences, and Communal Utopianism,” Utopian Studies 24.2 (2013): 232-263

Select Book Chapters:

“Psychedelic Spirituality, Visionary Ethics, and Collective Responsibility,” in The Handbook of Religion and Psychedelics (Routledge, expected 2027)

“Environmentalism, Ecological Activism/Theology, and New Religious Movements,” in New Religious  Movements in North America, 111-129 (Bloomsbury, 2024)

“Eschatological Ambiguity in Good Omens: How Concerns for Survival Blur the Line Between Good and Evil,” in Deciphering Good Omens: Nice and Accurate Essays on the Novel and Television Series, 104-119 (McFarland, 2023)

“‘A Critique of Culture:’ Alan Watts, Psychedelic Buddhism, and Religious Play in Postwar America,” The Relevance of Alan Watts in Contemporary Culture: Understanding Contributions and Controversies, 79-91 (Routledge, 2021)

“Entheogenic Judaism in Postwar America: Zalman Schachter-Shalomi and the Radical Religiosity of LSD Consciousness,” in Jewish Radicalisms: Historical Perspectives on a Phenomenon of Global Modernity, 213-240 (De Gruyter, European Jewish Studies Series, 2019)

Select Digital Scholarship:

“How to Find Spiritual Practices Without Religion,” Psyche, https://psyche.co/guides/how-to-find-new-spiritual-practices-without-religion, August 2024

“How ‘Nones’ − the Religiously Unaffiliated − are Finding Meaning, Purpose and Spirituality in Psychedelic Churches,” The Conversation, https://theconversation.com/how-nones-the-religiously-unaffiliated-are-finding-meaning-purpose-and-spirituality-in-psychedelic-churches-207461, October 10, 2023

“The Varieties of Spirituality,” The Academic Minute, A WAMC National Production, https://academicminute.org/2023/02/morgan-shipley-michigan-state-university-the-varieties-of-spirituality/, February 2, 2023

“From Atheist Churches to Finding Healing in the ‘Sacred Flower of Cannabis,’ Spiritual but not Religious Americans are Finding New Ways of Pursuing Meaning,” The Conversation, https://theconversation.com/from-atheist-churches-to-finding-healing-in-the-sacred-flower-of-cannabis-spiritual-but-not-religious-americans-are-finding-new-ways-of-pursuing-meaning-191840 October 31, 2022

“From the Madness of Reefer to the Ecstatic Bliss of Marijuana: What Cannabis Churches Tell Us About Religion, Ritual, and Tolerance in America,” Sacred Matters Magazine – Religious Currents in Culture, https://sacredmattersmagazine.com/from-the-madness-of-reefer-to-the-ecstatic-bliss-of-marijuana-the-rise-of-cannabis-churches (April 2019)

“Trump as Prophet and Priest: Civil Religion in the Age of Bans, Walls, and Alternative Facts,” Religious Studies News, http://rsn.aarweb.org/articles/beguiling-prophet-bumbling-priest-trump-and-civil-religion-age-bans-walls-and-alternative (May 2017)

“The Farm,” The World Religions and Spirituality Project, Spiritual and Visionary Communities Section, eds. David Bromley and Timothy Miller, http://wrldrels.org/profiles/TheFarm.htm (2015)

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