Molly Worthen

Molly Worthen (born 1981) is a journalist and historian of American religion. She is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times and a tenured professor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

Early life and education Raised in Glen Ellyn, Illinois, she graduated from Yale University in 2003 and earned a Ph.D. in American religious history from Yale's Religious Studies department in 2011. She self-described as growing up in a secular household, and was generally an agnostic theist.

Career Her first book, The Man on Whom Nothing Was Lost, a biography of American diplomat and Yale professor Charles Hill, was published in 2006 and reviewed by The Boston Globe and Michiko Kakutani in The New York Times. Her second book, Apostles of Reason, examines the history of American evangelicalism since 1945.

Her work has appeared in The New York Times, Slate, Time, The Boston Globe, The New Republic, The Dallas Morning News, and the Toledo Blade. She is an associate professor of history at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Her third book, Spellbound: How Charisma Shaped American History from the Puritans to Donald Trump, examines the impact of charisma as both a religious and political force in American life from the colonial period to the 21st century.

Personal life Influenced by J.D. Greear and Tim Keller, she converted to evangelical Christianity in 2022.

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