315. How Do Incensepunk Stories Imagine the Church’s Future?

So much sci-fi likes to imagine that humans survive for centuries with some knowledge of classic literature, music, and cultural memory—everything except our religious beliefs. But today we explore a new sci-fi subgenre that dares to suggest the opposite. Faithful priests and other religious heroes of the future may not be wicked villains. In fact, they may be kind of awesome—and potentially fight in powerful mech armor. What is this subgenre some creators call incensepunk?[1. Photo by Rod Long on Unsplash.] Episode sponsors All That Glows by Lauren Smyth Realm Makers 2026 Conference & Expo Author Update from Author Media Descendant Publishing Mission update New at Lorehaven: Stephen is on break for the annual Blue Ridge Mountains Christian Writers Conference; welcome to any new listeners he met while teaching about fantastical stories there Now we’re getting ready for Realm Makers. More on that soon. Subscribe free to get updates and join the Lorehaven Guild Concession stand Stephen and Zack are Protestants, and yet often enjoy fellowship with Catholic friends. Many creators of fantastical fiction, such as J.R.R. Tolkien, come from these other traditions. So we wanted to speak with today’s Catholic creators of fantastical stories. We’ll be joined today by the staff of Incensepunk Magazine They promise “High tech, high church… science fiction that envisions a future where faith is a living part of culture.” Backstories: Incensepunk staff Jon James, editor-in-chief Jon’s work has been published in the Listen: the Sound of Fear anthology, the Killer Queen comics anthology, Recompose Journal, Theme of Absence, and Rehumanize International. His hobbies are as multifarious as the genres he writes in. Follow him: Twitter, bsky, Substack, Website Yuval Kordov, developmental editor Yuval Kordov is a chronically creative nerd, tech professional, husband, and father to two amazing girls. Over the course of his random life, he has been a radio show DJ, produced experimental electronic music, created the world of Dark Legacies®, and built custom mechs with LEGO® bricks. Follow him: Twitter, bsky, Substack, Website Andrew Gillsmith | Marketing Director Andrew Gillsmith is a science fiction writer living in St. Louis, Missouri. He is the author of Our Lady of the Artilects, the Deserted Vineyard series, the Planet Gallywood series, and The Jerusalem Passage. He currently works in publisher development in the programmatic advertising space. He is married to Cheryl and has two young sons, a Great Dane, and a pet rat named Reggie. Follow him: Twitter, Substack 1. Who built the Roman sci-fi roads Exploring foundational sci-fi and fantasy stories from Catholic authors “What we call the Catholic novel isn’t necessarily about a Christianized or catholicized world, but simply…one in which the truth as Christians know it has been used as a light to see the world by.” —Flannery O’Connor 2. How the Roman sci-fi road is being rebuilt What Incensepunk does differently than secular, Protestant, or even other Catholic authors “Incensepunk is, at its core, a genre of longing. It desires a world in which traditional faiths and churches play a major role in society. Incensepunk extrapolates Byzantine and Gothic architecture styles into a modern world of skyscrapers and globalization. However, it is not regressive. It doesn’t view the past as good and the present as wicked and depraved. Instead, it tries to envision what the world could look like if faith and society were more integrated.” —from the Incensepunk Manifesto 3. Future directions for the Roman sci-fi road How the future is religious “Artificial intelligences do not undergo experiences, do not possess a body, do not feel joy or pain, do not mature through relationships, and do not know from within what love, work, friendship or responsibility mean. Nor do they have a moral conscience, since they do not judge good and evil, grasp the ultimate meaning of situations, or bear responsibility for consequences. They may imitate or even simulate, but they do not understand what they produce, for they lack the affective, relational, and spiritual perspective through which human beings grow in wisdom.” —Pope Leo XIV on X.com Com station Top question for listeners What is your favorite fantastical story featuring a Catholic character? From Victor DiGiovanni in response to Ep. 313: Should Christian-Made Stories Evangelize Nonbelievers? I love that we are in an era of Christian media to where a single book or movie or TV show doesn’t have to accomplish all the goals of Christian media.  It always seemed that a “Christian book” or film HAD to have a very straightforward call to action. Next on Fantastical Truth What if the wicked villains did conquer the elves? And what if a young elf-maiden was forced to carry the offspring of one of the invaders? That’s the new novel The Rending Cauldron, just brewed by fantasy author and Realm Makers co-founder Rebecca P. Minor. Next week, Becky joins us in the studio to explore tough topics, dark drama, and the expanding worlds of Christian-made fantastical fiction.