“Trump, Mysticism, and Psychedelics” – the title of the long conversation that today’s New York Times brings its readers, between its popular podcast host Ezra Klein and Religion columnist Ross Douthat – only barely hints at the realms explored over the course of their hour together. Prompted by the publication of Douthat’s Believe: Why Everyone Should Be Religious, the very thoughtful conversation feels noteworthy perhaps just because of the buttoned–up venue, but I hope that Masquerade readers might give it a listen and chime in with how the conversation struck your ears.

Half–playfully at one point asking Douthat if he is a fan of Christopher Nolan’s 2005 Batman Begins, Ezra – admitting that Marvel and DC superhero fantasies have more resonance for him than the Old or New Testaments – invokes the murderous League of Shadows as an apt picture of American governance in 2025. A few minutes later, the two glibly gifted conversationalists even touch upon the occult world of demonic “forces” (never beings), but then instantly shrink away from the topic, turning instead to psychedelic drugs and Jewish mysticism.

Douthat clearly has had lots of experience speaking with “Mysterians,” a label which Ezra Klein does not deny, and which perhaps after decades of pop occultism is replacing “agnostic” as a term of spiritual affiliation.

I am so reluctant to spoil the little surprises in this conversation that I send word of it out this Friday noon without editorial commentary, just as a kind of aside over lunchtime gabbing, from a very different direction than what has no doubt reached your ears this past week.

All good wishes for a blessed spring weekend in whatever garden you have the good fortune to be tilling.

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