Living Religion Collaborative faculty and student fellows are always on the go, exploring religion as it lives throughout the Silicon Valley and far beyond.
![Children playing at Duc Vien Buddhist Pagoda in San Jose. [Photo by Sam Nichols, SCU '20.]](/media/lrc-images/DucVien_SNichols01-447x595.png)
Children playing at Duc Vien Buddhist Pagoda in San Jose. [Photo by Sam Nichols, SCU '20.]
Upcoming Events
The LRC is helping to promote the following event:
Event: A Better Kind of Politics? Faith & Organizing in the Age of Trump
- Location: Religious Studies Lobby, Kenna 323
- When: Monday, Nov. 10, 5:15 PM
- Description: Across the political spectrum, a majority of Americans, especially young adults, are fed up with politics. To many, it feels divisive, disrespectful, fruitless, and toxic -- even as its stakes seem even higher. What can ordinary people do to create a "better kind of politics today?" What role can people of faith play? And how might faith-based community organizing offer a constructive way forward?
- Pizza and snacks will be served
- The event is will be led by Dr. Nicholas Hayes-Mota (Religious Studies); Featured guest: Liz Hall, Lead Organizer for Silicon Valley Allied for the Common Good.
- Register here.
Past Events
American Agitators: A Special Film Screening and Conversation
Nov. 4, 2025, 6-8 PM, St. Clare Room, Library and Learning Commons
Join the Ignatian Center for Jesuit Education, Silicon Valley Allied for the Common Good, and the Department of Religious Studies for a screening of the award-winning documentary American Agitators followed by a conversation on the film’s call to build a more democratic society.
American Agitators highlights IAF organizer Fred Ross Sr.’s work empowering ordinary people to fight injustice through grassroots organizing. Featuring leaders like Dolores Huerta and César Chávez, the film reveals the power of collective action to create a more democratic society.
Dr. Elizabeth Drescher's "Seeing Spirits of Silicon Valley in Place: Mural Art as Aesthetic and Epistemological Infrastructure in San José, California"
Oct. 14, 2025: 12:10-1:15 pm in Learning Commons 129.
This cross-sectional study analyzes religious and spiritual elements of murals as aesthetic and epistemological infrastructure in gentrifying San José neighborhoods. Fieldwork on 100+ murals shows religious imagery—from the Virgin of Guadalupe and Buddhist landscapes to local “saints”—anchoring identity, memory, and belonging. Seen through infrastructure theory, living religion, and spatial justice, my research argues murals are not decorative but constitutive, resisting placelessness imposed by corporate development and expanding scholarship on public art, material religion, and spatial justice.
- Rev. Dr. Bryan Franzen, Westminster Presbyterian Church
- Miah Jeffra, Author and Lecturer in English, Santa Clara University
- Pastor Leslie Nieves, CWC Life/Vida
- Dr. Todd Perreira, Lecturer in Humanities at San Jose State University
- Susan Ellenberg, District 4 Supervisor & President, Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors
October 19, 2022: Finding God in Googleville: A Conversations about Spatial Justice, Sustainable Urban Development, and Religious Engagement
This Bannan Forum with Elizabeth Drescher, Roberto Mata, Boo Riley, and Jaime Wright explored the role of religious communities, faith-based organizations, and individuals in addressing questions of justice, housing, and the creation of flourishing local communities. The panel members discussed policies, practices, and ideologies behind urban development and related projects in Silicon Valley and the ways in which they entangle global corporations, city governments, religious and community-based organizations, and local residents in fraught negotiations over spatial justice and sustainability.
January 12th, 2022: Elizabeth Drescher and Eboo Patel discussed the increase of nonreligious people in the US on KQED.
News
November 2025
Dr. Elizabeth Drescher presented on her work on San Jose murals at the SSSR Annual Meeting in Minneapolis, MN. Presentation title: "Seeing Spirits of Silicon Valley in Place: Mural Art as Aesthetic and Epistemological Infrastructure in San José, California."
September 2025
Sept. 29, Nicholas Hayes-Mota was a featured panelist for an event at Georgetown University, "Renewing Politics from the Ground Up: Lessons from Latino Organizing." This was a public dialogue sponsored by Georgetown's Initiative for Catholic Social Thought. Other participants included seasoned organizers (Joanna Arellano-Gonzalez and Rosie Villegas-Smith) and a veteran political campaigner (Julie Chávez Rodríguez) who also happens to be Cesar Chávez's granddaughter. Over 900 people tuned in for the livestream. The video from the event is available here.
May 2023
The Living Religion Collaborative is pleased to announce that Emily Moya ('24, Environmental Science, Biology) has been named as the LRC Technology Fellow for the 2023-24 academic year. Emily has been working with Jaime Wright on the LRC's Encounter geomap as part of the Finding God in Googleville project. With the support of a grant from the Dean's Office, Emily has also been developing layers on Encounter using historical maps from the late 19th and 20th century. As well, with support from a Center for Arts and Humanities fellowship, Emily will be working with Elizabeth Drescher on a project mapping and analyzing mural art in San Jose.
October 2022
In October, the Bannan Forum presented a panel highlighting the work of Religious Studies faculty members Elizabeth Drescher, Roberto Mata, Philip Boo Riley, and Jaime Wright, who have been exploring the role of religious communities, faith-based organizations, and individuals in addressing questions of justice, housing, and the creation of flourishing local communities. Click for more.
May 2022
The Living Religion Collaborative is pleased to announce that Danny Walsh (SCU '24) has been named as the LRC Communications Fellow for the 2022-23 academic year. Danny's primary work will be maintaining and enriching the LRC website and growing the LRC's social media presence. A major in Web Design and Engineering, Danny has recently worked with Amy Leuck (English) and Lee Panish (Anthro) to create the Ohlone Heritage Hub. LRC undergraduate fellowships have been funded by grants from the Bannan Institute and the Louisville Institute.
January 2022
LRC Faculty Fellows Elizabeth Drescher and Jaime Wright have been awarded a $30,000 grant to from the Louisville Institute for their project, “Finding God in Googleville: Mapping Christian Presence and Spatial Justice in Silicon Valley.”
LRC Faculty Publications
Elizabeth Drescher
Drescher, Elizabeth. Choosing Our Religion: The Spiritual Lives of America’s Nones (Oxford University Press, 2016).
Drescher, Elizabeth. Click 2 Save: Reboot – The Digital Ministry Bible, Revised 2nd Edition, with Keith Anderson (Church Publishing, 2019).
Drescher, Elizabeth. “Pew Poll: A Growing Number Of Americans Don't Celebrate Christmas As A Religious Holiday,” interview with Ray Suarez, “All Things Considered,” National Public Radio (December 24, 2017).
Drescher, Elizabeth. "A Campus Hardwired for Finding God," AJCU (April 18, 2017).
Roberto Mata
Mata, Roberto. "'And I Saw Googleville Descend from Heaven': Reading the New Jerusalem in Gentrified Latinx Communities of Silicon Valley," in Land of Stark Contrasts edited by Manuel Mejido Costoya (Fordham University Press, 2021), pp. 316-330.
Mata, Roberto. “Border Crossing into the New Jerusalem: The Eschatological Migration of God’s People in Revelation 2:12-2:29” in The Bible and Migration (Edited by Efrain Agosto & Jackie Hidalgo. Palgrave Press, 2018
Mata, Roberto. “Border-Patrolling the New Jerusalem: A Response to Jackie Hidalgo’s Revelation and Aztlan: Scriptures, Utopias, and the Chicano Movement,” in Perspectivas: Journal of the Hispanic Theological Initiative, editorial issue 15 (2018): 91-97.
Mata, Roberto. “Beyond Socialization and Attrition: Border Pedagogy in Biblical Studies,” In Transforming Graduate Biblical Education Ethos and Discipline (Edited by Elisabeth Schüssler-Fiorenza and Kent Harold Richards. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2010).
Mata, Roberto. Coming Out of Babylon: The Eschatological Migration of God’s People in the Apocalypse of John (Under contract with Lexington Fortress Press).
Mata, Roberto. “Self-Deporting from Babylon? A Latinx Borderlands Reading of Revelation 18:4” Reading Biblical Texts Together: Doing Minoritized Biblical Criticism (Editors Fernando Segovia and Benny T. Lieu; SBL press forthcoming 2021)
Mata, Roberto. “The Deportation of “Juan”: Migration Rhetoric and Empire in the Book of Revelation” in Open Theology (forthcoming Spring 2021).
Gaurika Mehta
Mehta, Gaurika, "Churning the Kalapani: Dark Water Histories, Oceanic Origins, and Marine Deities of the Indo-Caribbean Madrasi Diaspora," PURANA Media: Past, Present, Future (Sept. 29, 2025). https://doi.org/10.33009/fsop_purana-media139268
Claudia Moutray
Claudia Moutray, Ch. 3 "I am the Mother, Not the Other" in Barren: An Exploration of the Journey to Motherhood, J. LeBlanc and T. Page, eds. Demeter, 2025.
Thao Nguyen
Nguyen, Thao. Asian Catholic Women: Movements, Mission and Vision. Lexington Books. November 2019.
Nguyen, Thao. “Resistance, Dialogue, and Enduring Negotiation: Church and State in Vietnam.” Studies in World Christianity, December 2019, 25.
Nguyen, Thao. “The Vision of Asian Women in Interreligious Dialogue.” Mission Studies: Journal of the International Association for Mission Studies, October 2018, 36.
Nguyen, Thao. “Quan Am and Mary: Vietnamese Religious, Cultural, and Spiritual Phenomena.” Buddhist-Christian Studies, vol. 37, 2017, pp. 191–208. JSTOR. Accessed 5 May 2021.
Philip Boo Riley
Riley, Philip B., “Hanging out with Homeless Folks in Silicon Valley,” Bearings Magazine (October 2019).
KTVU (Featuring Boo Riley), "Santa Clara University Students Visit San Jose's Homeless as Part of Curriculum," (January 23, 2017).
Silicon Valley street photographer Emilio Bañuelos worked with the LRC’s Boo Riley to visually document life in a local homeless encampment. Find his photo essay here: “Resilience & Mercy at the Margins” in Bearings Magazine," (October 2019).
Jaime D. Wright
Wright, Jaime D., “Solidarity, Context, and Privilege: How GIS Maps and Ethnographic Methodologies Can Supplement Short-term Volunteering in Community-based Learning Programs,” Emerald Studies in Media and Communications (forthcoming TBD).
Wright, Jaime D., “The breast cancer role and strategies for minimizing emotional stress in social support networks,” for Santa Clara University, Sociology Department, Brown Bag Speaker Series, Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, CA. February 2018.
Wright, Jaime D., Discussion of article “‘I had to make them feel at ease’: Narrative accounts of how women with breast cancer navigate social support,” for the Pathways Study Community Board Meeting, Kaiser Permanente Northern California, Division of Research, Oakland, CA. December 2020.