The Other Madonna: Sex and Religion in Music

Ariana Grande’s “God Is A Woman,” Taylor Swift’s “False God,” Madonna’s “Like a Virgin” and Hozier’s “Take Me to Church.” Only one thing is clear from this episode- Alex does NOT know how to pronounce “Hozier.” 

In this episode, Alex and Katie discuss their thoughts on pop stars using religious and (in particular) Christian images as a way to talk about sex. Is it weird that Taylor Swift talks about praying to Jesus about her mom in the hospital, and then replaces him with sex in the next song of the album? If she’s calling this god false, does that mean she disproves of it, or is she living in it anyway? Can we judge Ms Swift that hard?
And what about Ariana? IS God a woman? If not, why not? What happens when Madonna goes too far- can she? AND HOW DO YOU ACTUALLY PRONOUNCE HOZIER? Is it possible that he might have the best reason to use a religious and sexual analogy?
These things and more, on this episode of Religious War. 

Some notes and references from this episode: 

• Songs mentioned and quoted: Taylor Swift’s “False God,” Ariana Grande’s “God is a Woman,” and Hozier’s “Take Me to Church.” 
• Hozier’s Tweet: This Reddit post discusses whether the referenced tweet was actually real. We couldn’t find the original tweet, so it’s fairly safe to say it was a parody, but still funny for our purposes: https://www.reddit.com/r/Hozier/comments/byq1ru/never_did_get_that_ride_to_church/ 
• Pope Meeting Madonna: Stephen Colbert’s Late Show doesn’t keep all of his clips on youtube, but this link shows that Madonna did in fact, say that she wanted to meet with the Pope. Alex said this was for LGBTQ rights, but actually, at a second glance it seems to be about the pro-choice movement instead: https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/jun/19/madonna-wants-meeting-with-pope-francis-to-convinc/ 
• Katie references Madonna in a reenactment of the crucifixion in Rome. Following up on this event, the BBC posted that Madonna actually took this part of her tour out of the tour’s taping:  http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6069260.stm 
• We reference the Wikipedia page for the song “Take Me to Church,” which is at this link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Take_Me_to_Church 

This episode brings up some really interesting ideas about the relationship between music and the church, especially with regards to pop culture. We’d love to hear what you think! Tag us on twitter @religiouswarpod. 

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Thanks!
Alex and Katie
Religious War the Podcast

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