Multi-Religious America

WR 153, Multi-Religious America, Methodist Theological School in Ohio, Fall Semester 2008
Dr. Paul D. Numrich

COURSE DESCRIPTION: Examines the social, civic, and theological implications of America’s “lively experiment” with religious diversity, paying special attention to developments since the 1960s, including immigration trends and new religious movements.

America has always been a religiously diverse land, even prior to the founding of the United States. American history features a number of recurrent themes and issues surrounding religious diversity, including accommodation, anti-clericalism and anti-institutionalism, assimilation, competition, conflict and contention, cooperation and harmony, debate, dialogue, dissent, domination, eclecticism, establishmentarianism and disestablishmentarianism, exceptionalism, exclusion, fragmentation, individualism, innovation, inquisitiveness, liberty (free expression), multiculturalism, national unity in diversity, negotiation of rights and responsibilities, non-conformism, pluralism, protest, renewal and revival, schism, sectarianism, separatism, spiritual seeking, syncretism, tension, tolerance, utopianism, and voluntarism. This course traces variations on such themes and issues throughout American religious history.

COURSE OBJECTIVES:

1. Identify and analyze recurrent themes and issues surrounding religious diversity throughout American history.
2. Research one primarily post-1960 religious group or movement as a case study in American religious diversity.
3. Develop one’s own perspective on the social, civic, and theological implications of American religious history in preparation for faithful participation in inter-religious interaction and informed leadership among fellow Christians and in the larger society.
4. Enhance the scholarly enterprise of the Consortium seminaries.

READINGS:

General:

Gaustad, Edwin S., and Leigh E. Schmidt. The Religious History of America: The Heart of the American Story from Colonial Times to Today. Rev. ed. New York: HarperCollins, 2002.

Jones, Lindsay, ed. Encyclopedia of Religion. 2nd ed. Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005. [MTSO/TLS Reference BL31.E46 2005, PCJ Reference 203.E42e 2005]

Laderman, Gary, and Luis Leon, eds. Religion and American Cultures: An Encyclopedia of Traditions, Diversity, and Popular Expressions. Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO, 2003.

Lippy, Charles H., and Peter W. Williams, eds. Encyclopedia of the American Religious Experience: Studies of Traditions and Movements. New York: Scribner, 1988. [MTSO/TLS Reference BL2525.E53, PCJ Reference 291.0973 L766e]

Melton, J. Gordon, ed. Encyclopedia of American Religions. Detroit: Gale, any edition. [MTSO Reference BL2530.U6 M443, PCJ Reference 200.973 M528e, TLS Reference BL2530.U6 M45]

Queen, Edward L., III, Stephen R. Prothero, and Gardiner H. Shattuck, Jr., eds. Encyclopedia of American Religious History. New York: Facts on File, any edition. [MTSO/TLS Reference BL2525.Q44]

The Religious Movements Homepage Project. U of Virginia. 26 August 2008 http://web.archive.org/web/20060907005952/http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/relmove/

Roof, Wade Clark, ed. Contemporary American Religion. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2000. [MTSO/TLS Reference 2525.C65, Reference PCJ 209.73 R776c]

Stein, Stephen J. Alternative American Religions. New York: Oxford UP, 2000. [TLS BL2525.S73]

Case Studies:

Council on American-Islamic Relations. “An Employer’s Guide to Islamic Religious Practices.” Washington, DC: Council on American-Islamic Relations, 2005. 21 August 2008.
www.cair.com/Portals/0/pdf/employment_guide.pdf.

Ebaugh, Helen Rose, and Janet Saltzman Chafetz. Religion and the New Immigrants: Continuities and Adaptations in Immigrant Congregations. Walnut Creek: AltaMira, 2000. [MTSO/TLS BL2525.R4616]

Eck, Diana L. A New Religious America: How a “Christian Country” Has Now Become the World’s Most Religiously Diverse Nation. San Francisco: Harper, 2002. [MTSO/TLS BL2525.E35]

Kniss, Fred, and Paul D. Numrich. Sacred Assemblies and Civic Engagement: How Religion Matters for America’s Newest Immigrants. New Brunswick: Rutgers UP, 2007. [on order at Consortium libraries]

Mann, Gurinder Singh, Paul David Numrich, and Raymond B. Williams. Buddhists, Hindus, and Sikhs in America. New York: Oxford UP, 2001. [TLS BL2525.M356]

Numrich, Paul D. The Faith Next Door: American Christians and Their New Religious Neighbors. New York: Oxford UP, forthcoming.

 Numrich, Paul D. “Living among People of Other Faiths: Two Types of Inter-Religious Cooperation to Create a Better Neighborhood, Town, Nation, and World.” Address. Church of the Brethren Annual Conference. Cleveland. 3 July 2007.

Numrich, Paul David. Old Wisdom in the New World: Americanization in Two Immigrant Theravada Buddhist Temples. Knoxville: U of Tennessee P, 1996. [MTSO/TLS BQ734.N86]

Prothero, Stephen, ed. A Nation of Religions: The Politics of Pluralism in Multireligious America. Chapel Hill: U of North Carolina P, 2006.

Warner, R. Stephen, and Judith G. Wittner, eds. Gatherings in Diaspora: Religious Communities and the New Immigration. Philadelphia: Temple UP, 1998. [MTSO BL632.5.U5.G37]

 


The use of the term “livlie experiment” in reference to American religious liberty derives from the Charter of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, granted by King Charles II, July 15, 1663.

The Constitution mentions religion explicitly in two places: 1) “. . . no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States” (Article 6, Clause 3); and 2) “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” (1st Amendment).

“The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” [1]

















[1]  William Faulkner, Requiem for a Nun, qtd. in Edwin S. Gaustad and Leigh E. Schmidt, The Religious History of America: The Heart of the American Story from Colonial Times to Today, rev. ed. (New York: HarperCollins, 2002) 5.