Recently, a federal appeals court agreed that a Texas school board can have students offer prayers at their board meetings. (www.foxsnews.com, Associated Press) The American Humanist Association and another party had filed a lawsuit against the school district because of this practice, but their case was dismissed by a lower court ruling. (www.foxnews.com, Associated Press) Then, this ruling by the federal appeals court basically upheld the lower court’s ruling. (www.foxnews.com, Associated Press) The appeals court declared that prayers at meetings for legislative bodies are not the same as praying in public schools. (www.foxnews.com, Associated Press) Therefore, it does not violate the first amendment’s prohibition of a state or government religion. (www.foxnews.com, Associated Press) Some may still argue that this practice is cutting it close though. However, in the end this is just a group of people who want to express and practice their faith in their own way. Asking God to bless everyone there and to insure their meetings are productive isn’t a bad thing, and for some, prayers aren’t just something meant for church only. For them, it’s about practicing their faith more individually in day-to-day life. Practicing one’s faith in these little ways is becoming more and more common as people tailor religion to suit their lives more.
Ancient Israeli Artifacts Give Insight to Life of Jesus
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/how-did-jesus-live-this-new-israeli-excavation-could-provide-some-clues/2017/03/20/a94bd0d4-0d6a-11e7-b2bb-417e331877d9_story.html?utm_term=.61124331c955
Washington Post– How Did Jesus’ Early Followers Live?
The construction of a highway into Jerusalem is in the works. With this construction, Israeli archaeologists have stumbled upon several important, ancient artifacts from the Byzantine era. Primarily, these artifacts included 9 coins with faces of Byzantine emperors on them. They are thought to have been left in the wall of a building for safe keeping around 614, near the end of Persian invasion of the Holy Land. Studiers of the artifacts think that the person who left the coins most likely intended to come back for their belongings but never had the chance. The building was a structure in an “unearthed village” that provided refuge for Christian pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem 2000 years ago.
The article illuminates how these coins serve to help us understand how Jesus and his prophets lived back then. Although it doesn’t prove his particular existence, it does provide evidence of how and where he and his followers may have had lived by giving archeologists a look into the ancient Christian world. This also validates this particular place to be of Christian, Jewish and Muslim significance.
This historical and religious development is related to what we are learning in class because it proves both the historical importance of ancient religions, and its decline in the modern day. The fact that this village of Christian refuge had been completely forgotten, and only was rediscovered because of highway development speaks to the secularization theory. Despite the religious significance, the highway will open in a few months as planned. The article even points out that indeed, “Christian presence across the Middle East is diminishing and believers often face persecution”.
Gorsuch’s Selective View of Religious Freedom
Source: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/03/gorsuchs-selective-view-of-religious-freedom/520104/
In this article, Garrett Epps of “The Atlantic” discusses the views held by Neal Gorsuch, Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court; particularly those beliefs appertaining to religious freedom. Epps discusses Gorsuch’s views on the recent Hobby Lobby case, wherein the crafts store fought against the ACA’s amendment requiring employers to provide insurance for medically approved forms of birth control. The owners of Hobby Lobby resisted, claiming that their religious beliefs were being violated. Gorsuch, as it is revealed, agreed with Hobby Lobby, writing: “All of us face the problem of complicity. All of us must answer for ourselves whether and to what degree we are willing to be involved in the wrongdoing of others. For some, religion provides an essential source of guidance both about what constitutes wrongful conduct and the degree to which those who assist others in committing wrongful conduct themselves bear moral culpability. The Greens [owners of Hobby Lobby Stores] are among those who seek guidance from their faith on these questions.” This, Epps argues, is a dangerous opinion to have, because it infringes on the same religious freedom rights of the employees being discriminated against. Epps also mentions the proposed First Amendment Defense Act, which would protect employers from any repercussion for discriminating against LGBT individuals, as their right to observe a religion which condemns such individuals is protected by the Act. Epps expresses concern that Gorsuch, if elected, will maintain such narrow and selective views of religious freedom during his time on the Supreme Court.
Neil Gorsuch and Religion
Neil Gorsuch is Trump’s Supreme court nominee. Being a Supreme court judge is a live long position so if Neil does get Congress approval then he could be effecting our lives for many years to come. Both sides of the aisle though, have something against Gorsuch as reported by CNN. Gorsuch worships at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Boulder, Colorado and the church isn’t strictly conservative. It bars guns from its campus and installed solar panels and it condemns harsh rhetoric about Muslims and welcomes gays and lesbians. Some conservative congressmen feel that Gorsuch’s religious ideals don’t aline with what they want. Bryan Fischer, a host on the American Family Radio Network. stated, “Be advised, Gorsuch attends a church that is rabidly pro-gay, pro-Muslim, pro-green, and anti-Trump.” On the other side of the aisle, democrats are calling Gorsuch on religious freedoms and his take on the Burwell vs. Hobby Lobby Stores. The case was about if Hobby Lobby had to provide health insurance that covered contraceptive to their employees. The owners of Hobby Lobby are religious and feel that they shouldn’t be forced to provide contraceptive if they don’t believe in it. Gorsuch states that “All of us must answer for ourselves whether and to what degree we are willing to be involved in the wrongdoing of others. For some, religion provides an essential source of guidance both about what constitutes wrongful conduct and the degree to which those who assist others in committing wrongful conduct themselves bear moral culpability.” Basically, Gorsuch feels that some beliefs are religious, and protected; other beliefs on the very same issues are secular, and should be brushed aside.
Reflection 3/12 to 3/19
This week we discussed the theory of secularization and how it applies to the landscape of religion in Europe and Britain. There were many conflicting articles with many conflicting views on the topic, and overall it was very interesting to see so many different interpretations on the concept. The question of whether or not religion is disappearing proved to be a much more complicated question than I would have expected going into this class. Beforehand I never would have thought that there was a chance of religion dying out anywhere, but now I understand that there’s a very real possibility that it could vanish completely, at least from some areas of the world. And I must admit that while I was apprehensive of this “jigsaw” format of teaching at first, it has proven to be a much more interesting method of education than I would have thought. It’s proven engaging and meaningful, and an excellent way to introduce students to many different standpoints on an issue. I look forward to how this teaching method applies to the concept of individualized religion tomorrow, as it proves to be a very interesting topic to discuss. Already the article I’ve been assigned to, “Everyday Religion as Lived,” by McGuire, has raised interesting points about the nature of individualized religion, and I look forward to seeing what’s discussed by the other articles. This topic is especially interesting to me because it seems rather related to the case study I read, Sacred Stories, Spiritual Tribes, and I look forward to seeing how the rest of the articles connect.
An Unsecular America
Before taking this class, I believed America was a pretty religious country but perhaps was becoming more secular because of modernization and education. However the articles I read this week articulated that the traditional model of secularization theory does not match up with the real data collected. The traditional model states that industrialization, urbanization, and rationalization came to dominate society, while religious loses it’s importance. However through Finke’s research, he ultimately argues that this model is false when looking at the US because the US is exceptional when it comes to its relationship with religion. His research and evidence show that religious organizations and commitment of individuals remain vital. The most rapidly growing denominations hold a firm belief in the literal interpretation of the Bible. The lack of religious regulation in the US have kept the country religious since the beginning. Because there is a separation of religion and state, sectarian movements formed quickly because there was no fear from the State. In fact religious leaders believed that sectarian groups benefited those with less privilege and the working class or “uneducated”. As a result, it has created a testing ground for religious innovation, have appealed to a large segments of the population, and held a special appeal to the working classes. So for those who believe the US is becoming less religious, guess again because the country remains religious for the most part, however beliefs and personal faiths have just shifted. Many people are not saying they are “spiritual” rather than religious.
Religion and Secularization
Last week in class we focused on secularization in religion. We broke up into groups and each read a different article focusing on this topic. The article I read was “Secularization and its Discontents” by Warner. This article was very informative, although a little long and hard to follow. The main points of this article were sectioned off into five parts: empirical data of church decline, the intellectual context of church decline, social forces of secularization: individualism and rationalization, further socio-cultural dynamics of secularization, and secularization theory and the marginality of religion. This article talked about many reasons for secularization in Europe, but the point that stood out to me the most was about the Age of Enlightenment and how that affected the legitimacy of some people’s religious beliefs in the nineteenth century. I found that point to be the easiest to understand and the one that made the most sense to me. Religion has always been a way to explain the unexplainable, and the rise of reason and science took the place of religion in some sense. All of the articles that we discussed in class touched on different points about secularizaiton, but they were all very informative and shed light on a multitude of different theories. This topic is something I would like to continue to discuss in class, as it seems to have many layers.
Is Secularization a trait of American Religion?
This past week the concept of Secularization in Religion was stressed in both class periods. At first I found myself thinking that secularization seemed very apparent in the world and reading Christianity in Britain, R.I.P. by Bruce reassured those feelings I was having. The possibility that religion was slowly taking a new form started to frighten me because my religion is the biggest part of my life and I do not want the environment of religion to change too much. Then I came into class on Wednesday and the presentations on the rest of the articles, I had not read, started to give me a new perspective. There seemed to be more possibilities that secularization was not really taking complete control of the world. It seems to be possible that the United Stated wasn’t even being affected by secularization. I personally believe that a change in the structure, dynamic, belief, and society around religion is occurring among us. Although, now I have begun to be swayed by articles like Finke’s, which stress that America is unsecular. It could very well be true that just Europe has had a takeover of secularization. The arguments that Bruce made about Europe just seemed strikingly familiar to what is also happening here in America through my eyes. What has given me hope from all of the readings, is the idea that America is still so fresh and new in its religion. I am not ready to except that America is going to let go of its ideals quite that easy.
Opposing Views
After the presentations on Wednesday and the multiple readings for class, it is clear to see that we are learning about many opposing views. Many sociologists have different ideas about how religion affects society and this helps us shape our own views. Understanding the opposing views on certain things can be beneficial in making decision about personal views. It is interesting to see how Dr. Spickard’s views are different than McGuire’s or other sociologists that we have read. It is also interesting to see where a person’s bias is and how that may effect thoughts or results of studies. Reading the articles felt slightly unsettling because after reading one article and feeling good about it, it was weird reading another and not quite agreeing with it–I almost felt like I didn’t want to read any more of the articles I did not resonate with. Will there ever be something that everyone agrees on? Life and education would be so boring if all views were the same, and it wouldn’t even seen worthwhile, would it?
If we don’t understand opposing views, how can formulate our own? If we do not know what others believe and why they believe it, how are we then able to understand and formulate our own thoughts on the matter? As students, having the blog to post on and read each other’s work is very beneficial because it allows us to understand how our peers are thinking about the material we are learning together.
The Correlation Between Religion and Spirituality
Zimbauer’s, “Religion and Spirituality”, shows and discusses the methods and results of a study to find correlations between religiousness and spirituality. Questioning primarily white respondents from a multitude of ages and beliefs, they asked how people identified, whether they felt if there was an overlap between the two, and looked to find whether there was a positive or negative connotation tied with either or both of the categories. The study found that spirituality was more closely linked to individual experience, while religiousness was tied to structured beliefs, groups, and organizations. The article showed a graph of each of the groups (religiously affiliated and not) questioned and showed their responses to whether they were religious, spiritual, or both. It was more common for New Age groups to identify with spirituality that religion and although spirituality had overall higher responses, Roman Catholics identified as both almost equally. Through the progression of this course there has been more and more evidence to show that identification with religion has been decreasing and spirituality has been increasing. After reading this article and Nancy Ammerman’s, “Sacred Stories, Sacred Tribes”, I have learned that it is possible to identify as both religious and spiritual, religious and not spiritual, and spiritual and not religious. I have begun to question which way our society will move with the shift from religiousness to spirituality. Will the ways our religious communities practice change to adapt to what people are believing? Will western religions grow more similar to eastern religions by focusing on one’s self and meditating? It will be interesting to see how these categories shift over time and if they stay separate categories all together.