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Everyone Orthodox to Themselves
Religious liberty is one of the hallmarks of American democracy,
but the principal architects of this liberty believed that it was
only compatible with a certain form of Christianity-namely, a
liberal, rational, Christianity. Conservative and postliberal
champions of the freedom of religion often ignore this point,
sometimes even arguing that orthodox Christianity was, or should
be, at the root of democratic liberty.
Everyone Orthodox to Themselves , John Colman's close
study of the religious views and political theologies of John
Locke, Benjamin Franklin, James Madison, and Thomas Jefferson,
shows otherwise. Colman demonstrates that Locke and his three
American students specifically took aim at the idea of orthodoxy,
which they argued continuously tempted its believers to try to
impose an artificial uniformity upon the religious diversity that
naturally exists in society and thought it necessary to advance a
more rational, nondogmatic Christianity given the threat they saw
religious orthodoxy posed to a free, liberal society.
While recent arguments have endorsed the idea that there is a
crisis of liberalism that can only be met by the revival of more
orthodox forms of religious devotion, Colman argues that, according
to some of the most prominent American Founders and their
philosophic predecessors, such orthodoxy is incompatible with
religious freedom and the right to free inquiry. Everyone
Orthodox to Themselves demonstrates that only a nondogmatic,
rationalist Christianity could be made a friend rather than an
adversary to the inalienable right of religious liberty.
Colman's work reveals how the reform of Christianity, and with
it the inculcation of a particular theological disposition, is
necessary to secure religious liberty and the right of free
inquiry. The book also establishes the importance of Locke's
Reasonableness of Christianity for his larger argument for
toleration.
eBook
City of Gods: Religious Freedom, Immigration, and Pluralism in Flushing, Queens
Known locally as the birthplace of American religious freedom, Flushing, Queens, in New York City is now so diverse and densely populated that it has become a microcosm of world religions. City of Gods explores the history of Flushing from the colonial period to the aftermath of September 11, 2001, spanning the origins of Vlissingen and early struggles between Quakers, Dutch authorities, Anglicans, African Americans, Catholics, and Jews to the consolidation of New York City in 1898, two World's Fairs and postwar commemorations of Flushing's heritage, and, finally, the Immigration Act of 1965 and the arrival of Hindus, Sikhs, Muslims, Buddhists, and Asian and Latino Christians. A synthesis of archival sources, oral history, and ethnography, City of Gods is a thought-provoking study of religious pluralism. Using Flushing as the backdrop to examine America's contemporary religious diversity and what it means for the future of the United States, R. Scott Hanson explores both the possibilities and limits of pluralism. Hanson argues that the absence of widespread religious violence in a neighborhood with such densely concentrated religious diversity suggests that there is no limit to how much pluralism a pluralist society can stand. Seeking to gauge interaction and different responses to religious and ethnic diversity, the book is set against two interrelated questions: how and where have the different religious and ethnic groups in Flushing associated with others across boundaries over time; and when has conflict or cooperation arisen? By exploring pluralism from a historical and ethnographic context, City of Gods takes a micro approach to help bring an understanding of pluralism from a sometimes abstract realm into the real world of everyday lives in which people and groups are dynamic and integrating agents in a complex and constantly changing world of local, national, and transnational dimensions. Perhaps the most extreme example of religious and ethnic pluralism in the world, Flushing is an ideal place to explore how America's long experiment with religious freedom and religious pluralism began and continues. City of Gods reaches far beyond Flushing to all communities coming to terms with immigration, religion, and ethnic relations, raising the question as to whether Flushing will come together in new and lasting ways to build bridges of dialogue or will it further fragment into a Tower of Babel.
eBook
The Production of American Religious Freedom
Americans love religious freedom. Few agree, however, about what they mean by either \"religion\" or \"freedom.\" Rather than resolve these debates, Finbarr Curtis argues that there is no such thing as religious freedom. Lacking any consistent content, religious freedom is a shifting and malleable rhetoric employed for a variety of purposes. While Americans often think of freedom as the right to be left alone, the free exercise of religion works to produce, challenge, distribute, and regulate different forms of social power.
The book traces shifts in the notion of religious freedom in America from The Second Great Awakening, to the fiction of Louisa May Alcott and the films of D.W. Griffith, through William Jennings Bryan and the Scopes Trial, and up to debates over the Tea Party to illuminate how Protestants have imagined individual and national forms of identity. A chapter on Al Smith considers how the first Catholic presidential nominee of a major party challenged Protestant views about the separation of church and state. Moving later in the twentieth century, the book analyzes Malcolm X's more sweeping rejection of Christian freedom in favor of radical forms of revolutionary change. The final chapters examine how contemporary controversies over intelligent design and the claims of corporations to exercise religion are at the forefront of efforts to shift regulatory power away from the state and toward private institutions like families, churches, and corporations. The volume argues that religious freedom is produced within competing visions of governance in a self-governing nation.
eBook
From India to Israel
Between May 1948 and December 1951, Israel received approximately 684,000 immigrants from across the globe. The arrival of so many ethnic, linguistic, and cultural groups to such a small place in such a short time was unprecedented and the new country was ill-prepared to absorb its new citizens. The first years of the state were marked by war, agricultural failure, a housing crisis, health epidemics, a terrible culture clash, and a struggle between the religious authorities and the secular government over who was going to control the state. In From India to Israel, Joseph Hodes examines Israel's first decades through the perspective of an Indian Jewish community, the Bene Israel, who would go on to play an important role in the creation of the state. He describes how a community of relatively high status and free from persecution under the British Raj left the recently independent India for fear of losing status, only to encounter bias and prejudice in their new country. In 1960, a decision made by the religious authorities to ban the Bene Israel from marrying other Jews on the grounds that they were not \"pure Jews\" set in motion a civil rights struggle between the Indian community and the religious authority with far-reaching implications. After a drawn-out struggle, and under pressure from both the government and the people, the Bene Israel were declared acceptable for marriage. A detailed look at how one immigrant community fought to maintain their place within a religion and a society, From India to Israel raises important questions about the state of Israel and its earliest struggles to absorb the diversity in its midst.
eBook
University Commons Divided
Investigating issues of university governance in Canada,University Commons Dividedanalyzes several major cases at the university level that have come to exemplify infringements on the freedom of expression
eBook