Summary An early visual mass medium, the magic lantern was omnipresent in most Western societies between 1880 and 1930. The Christian Church, especially the Catholics, spiritual associations such as the Freemasons, political interest groups, and teaching institutions all made use of lectures enriched by projected images to disseminate information, convictions, and doctrines. Moreover, the lantern often featured as a concealed aid in stage spectacles. Nineteen authors analyse the effects of "the beam of light in the dark" in the context of religion, faith, and belief. Attention is paid to the wide spectrum of locations where projections took place, as well as to the lantern's impressive versatility. The lavishly illustrated chapters collected in this volume range from analyses of religious propaganda to fundraising lectures for missionary work in China, from the fight against alcoholism to the secularisation of society, and from the lantern's application in spiritualist sessions to its use in science and teaching. TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction Part 1. An Overview of the Archives: Religious Lantern Heritage and its Historical Discursive Frameworks Isabelle Saint-Martin, The Paupers' Bible by Lantern Slides: Christian Pedagogy and the Magic Lantern Pierre Véronneau, Le Fascinateur and Maison de la Bonne Presse: Catholic Media for Francophone Audience Bart G. Moens, New Light on Maison de la Bonne Presse and its Service des Projections Greet de Neef, Mission Projections: Glass Positives in the Archives of the Religious Institutes in KADOC Wouter Egelmeers, Making Pupils See: The Use of Optical Lantern Slides in Catholic Geography Teaching in Belgium Part 2. Catholic Projections in a Modern Light: Infrastructure, Theory, Strategies Margo Buelens-Terryn, Iason Jongepier, and Ilja Van Damme, Shine a Light: Catholic Media Use, Transformations in the Public Sphere, and the Voice of the Urban Masses (Antwerp and Brussels, c. 1880 - c. 1920) Frank Kessler, and Sabine Lenk, Teaching Faith with the Lantern: Audio-visual Lantern Performances by the Clergy in France and Belgium Around 1900 Natalija Majsova, The Bijou Collection: A Multimedial Constellation for Multimodal Experiences Adeline Werry, and Sébastien Fevry, The Editorial Strategy of the Bijou Collection: When Media Diversification Reinforces an Edifying Ambition Dominique Nasta, and Bart G. Moens, Religious Temperance Propaganda and Multimodal Aesthetics of Emotion: The Lantern Slide Set 'Un poison mortel' and Early Film Adaptations of Émile Zola's L'Assommoir Natalija Majsova, and Philippe Marion, The Edifying Structures of the Bijou Imaginary: An Investigation into Images, Rhetoric, Memory, and Politics Part 3. Projecting Aspirations, Challenges, and Fears: The Spiritual Lantern Kurt Vanhoutte, Deep Time Through the Lens of the Magic Lantern: Genesis and Geology Nelleke Teughels, Films fixes, the Forgotten Medium of the Catholic Battle Against Secularization in Interwar Belgium Evelien Jonckheere, 'Hidden Lanterns' in fin-de-siècle France and Belgium: (Dis)Belief in Spiritualist Apparitions at the Fairground, Music-hall and Artistic Cabaret Sabine Lenk, Masonic Slide Cultures: Teaching, Meditation, Optimisation Part 4. Historical Articles on Slide Performances by the Church Bou. 'La Rédemption', Journal de Roubaix, 30 December 1908, quoted in Anonymous. 'Causerie du mois', Le Rayon 1 (January 1909): 2-4 (facsimile) Neue evangelische Garnisonskirche. 'Lichtbilderpredigt über das Leben Jesu, I. Teil', printed by Ernst Schimkönig, Berlin 1909 (facsimile)