Letter from Alan Wolfe
Dear Colleague:
In the summer of 2009, I will be offering a seminar, under the sponsorship of the National Endowment for the Humanities, devoted to the theme of “Religious Diversity and the Common Good.” The seminar will be held for six weeks at Boston College, starting June 2, 2009 and lasting until July 9, 2009. In this letter I would like to offer an overview of the seminar’s themes and discuss some of its practicalities.
The question of whether individuals with radically different religious views can live together in the same society is one that few countries have been able to solve, including the United States. Was the United States in fact more unified when a greater percentage of its citizens were Christian? Can we insist on a common culture that has been so strongly influenced by one religious tradition? Even if we could, should we, now that we have such disagreements on matters involving marriage, work, educational values, or the definition of when life begins? Does such an insistence violate the rights of those whose cultural roots and traditions have had little purchase in American history? Are there principles that can guide answers to these questions likely to be widely accepted as legitimate? Recent decisions by American courts involving issues as diverse as whether a Muslim woman can wear a head covering in her driver’s license photo, whether the words “Under God” should appear in the Pledge of Allegiance, whether gay marriage is permissible and whether such marriages would apply both to civil and religious ceremonies, whether the placing of a statue of the Ten Commandments in a courtroom violates the rights of non-believers or adherents to minority religions, and whether public comments by religious leaders questioning Islam’s claims to religious truth are a form of hate speech – all of these reflect the fact that while our Constitution insists on separation of church and state, it says nothing about church and culture.
These are enormously important questions to ask at any time, but they are especially important to address in the wake of September 11. The aftermath of that event, on the one hand, revealed to many Americans as never before how many of their fellow citizens (or future citizens) come from religious traditions dramatically at odds with their own. But it also demonstrated that American culture, which has shaped Catholicism and Judaism in distinctly American ways, is shaping Islam (and other religions such as Buddhism) in similar ways. It may not be an exaggeration to say that the way we find answers to the question of common moral values in the face of religious differences is vital to the future security of the Untied States.
To explore these kinds of questions, “Religious Diversity and the Common Good” will meet for six weeks. Each week will contain two three-hour sessions devoted to a specific reading assignment and one two-hour session reserved for synthetic discussion. I will lead each discussion, although, depending on the expertise of the participants, it may make sense to have specific individuals take responsibility for particular texts, especially in the fifth week when individual projects are discussed. Participants will be expected to read the common texts for each particular session. All participants will be expected to reflect on the ways the material discussed during the seminar can help them with their teaching, research, or institutional development; this will generally take place through a written project, but other forms of reflection will be accepted. I will be available to read and offer feedback on projects that participants develop. In addition, I will be available for “office hours” and will seek out the opportunity to talk with each participant on an individual basis.
Participants for the seminar will be welcome from a wide variety of academic fields, including (but not limited to) political science and law, theology, philosophy, and religious studies, sociology and anthropology, history, literature, music, and art, and communication.
Each participant will receive a stipend of $4,400 for the six weeks. Half will be available for the participants when they arrive and the other half will be available halfway through the summer. Participants will be designed as “visiting faculty” and will have access to all the facilities of Boston College during their stay. In particular, they will be free to use the facilities offered by the Boisi Center, including desk space, access to computers, and a kitchen.
Let me offer an overview of the themes with which the seminar will be concerned.
The first week will be dedicated to philosophical issues. One school of political philosophy, originating in Kant and developed by John Rawls and Jurgen Habermas, argues that citizens, even when they strongly disagree, can at least agree to deliberate rationally over their differences. Two contemporary political philosophers, Amy Gutmann and Stephen Macedo, in particular have extended this position to some of our contemporary controversies; both insist, for example, that because good citizens ought to be thoughtful and deliberative ones, public schools can legitimately turn down requests by fundamentalist parents not to have their children exposed to literature they consider irreligious or immoral. (Macedo goes further and suggests that liberal democracies ought to prevent fundamentalist parents from enrolling their children in private schools that teach from a fundamentalist perspective.) There is, in this tradition, a strong affirmation of a common morality, one rooted in the Enlightenment and then applied in the United States through our commitments to liberal democracy.
But critics have pointed out that the Enlightenment is itself partisan and partial, defending one particular understanding of morality against others, a position articulated by Alasdair MacIntyre in After Virtue. If MacIntyre is right, then so is Stanley Fish, who argues in The Trouble With Principle that deliberative democracy is not neutral between various religions or between religion and non-religion but represents an effort by liberals and secularists to impose their values on others who do not share them. Theologian Stanley Hauerwas goes one step further and calls on religious believers to consider themselves “resident aliens” in a liberal democratic society on the assumption that their faith commitments will never be welcome so long as a common morality is based on liberal assumptions.
I believe that the texts that explore these positions are generally written with sufficient verve and clarity of thought to constitute an excellent beginning for the seminar. They will help us address questions such as these: What role does reason play in religious faith? Is the influence of reason different between religions? Is religion a category like race or gender that involves discrimination by some against others? Are fundamentalist Christians, as critics such as anthropologist Vincent Crapanzano have suggested, hostile to reasoned debate? Is America a primarily religious society, as secularists often charge, or a primarily secular society, as believers often conclude? Does liberal democracy involve faith commitments of its own? What are the prospects for a common morality in a society composed of so many different beliefs? If those prospects are good, do they come at the cost of discriminating against those who reject liberal assumptions about the common good? If those prospects are bad, do liberal democracies face an uncertain future?
The second week of the seminar will offer an overview of the historical transformation of the United States from a predominantly Protestant to a religiously diverse society. That transformation has involved at least four phases: from Protestant to Christian (e. g, including Catholics), from Christian to Judeo-Christian, from Judeo-Christian to Abrahamic (e. g., including Islam), and an emerging situation (without a name) that includes not only the three so-called religions of the book, but a variety of Eastern religions, people who call themselves spiritual but not religious, and, in the aftermath of the “Under God” controversy, a more assertive atheism.
There is no one text that covers all of these phases. For this week of the seminar I would assign chapters from a number of important books that cover various aspects of these changes, including Winthrop Hudson’s American Protestantism; Will Herberg’s Protestant Catholic Jew; John McGreevy’s Catholicism and American Freedom; Diana Eck’s A New Religious America; and Susan Jacoby’s Freethinkers.
Among the questions to be addressed from the historical materials are these: Is the United States an exception to the so-called “secularization thesis,” which holds that as societies become more modern, religion loses its hold on people’s attachments? Is separation of church and state a secular idea or a specifically Protestant one? What does it mean for a tradition that has generally been identified with a state church in Europe – Catholicism – to flourish in a Tocquevillian environment of voluntary associations? Why have Jews historically been the one religious group most committed to separation of church and state in practice? Does freethinking have religious roots? What does it mean – in other words, is it possible – to be spiritual but not religious? I want to emphasize in this section of the seminar the difference between “religion” and “religions.” When we debate the role of “religion” in shaping a common morality, we tend to forget that people do not believe in religion in general but in specific religions with their own traditions and histories. This fact both complicates the role that religion does or should play in fashioning a common morality, but it also adds the richness of different experiences with the question.
The third week of the seminar will deal with sociological changes in the contemporary practice of religion. The philosophical and historical literature on religion makes some assumptions about people of faith that require further examination. For example, in the debate between Fish and Gutmann or Macedo, both sides agree that religious people are to some degree counter-cultural; the latter view them as never having fully subscribed to the rules of modern liberal democracy, while Fish (or Hauerwas) suggest that it is precisely the fact that believers are not liberals that make them different from everyone else. But are religious believers really that distinctive? The sociology of religion has an answer, and it is that modern American religion is as modern and American as it is religious. In the way they worship, honor (or dishonor) tradition, treat creeds and doctrines, relate to institutions, and search for identity, religious believers have been influenced by the same forces – individualism, popular culture, democracy – that have shaped non-religious activities from sports to politics.
This, at least, is the argument I make in my recent book, The Transformation of American Religion (Free Press 2003), which would form the basis of the discussions for this week. I will supplement the treatment of Transformation with some of the excellent ethnographic work on American religion done by R. Marie Griffith (Pentecostal women), Omar McRoberts (African-Americans), and Lynn Davidman (Orthodox Jews). I also plan to invite scholars in the Boston area who have dealt with these questions, such as Nancy Ammerman, Jytte Klausen, and Stephen Prothero of Boston University, to meet with the group.
Among other issues, we will discuss in this week whether all religions in America, despite the distinct histories examined in the previous week, will blend into a particularly American synthesis. This is a way of asking whether a common morality can be determined through a generalized religion detached from the moorings of all specific religions, and, if so, whether such a common morality would violate the beliefs of people who are not religious at all. In short, I see a tension between the historical work in the field and the sociological, with the former emphasizing what makes religions different and the latter dealing with some of the commonalties. Can both be correct? If so, what does this teach us about the relative salience of religion and culture, both enormously powerful forces that shape how people act and think, but also ones that can come into conflict with each other?
For the fourth week, the seminar will turn to the question of whether or not the perspective being developed in the seminar is helpful in treating important legal cases in the United States. Here the readings will be of two kinds. On the one hand, participants ought to be familiar with some of the important attempts to provide an overview dealing with questions of religious establishments and separation of church and state in America. Fortunately, Philip Hamburger has recently published the seminal text on this question, Separation of Church and State, which will be required reading. Not unlike MacIntyre, Hamburger argues that separation of church and state is not neutral; its historical origins, he claims, have much to do with the anti-Catholicism of the eighteenth century Republic (a point underscored by John Locke’s A Letter Concerning Religious Toleration, which found the basis for toleration in Protestant theology and which contains, as does John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty much later, some pretty harsh words about Catholics).
Hamburger’s analysis is helpful in understanding what can be called the decline of strict separationism. Since the 1960s, when the U. S. Supreme Court generally decided against allowing religious displays or religious sentiments in public places, there has been, depending on which side you are on, a retreat from strict separationism or a greater attempt to be fair to people of faith. The seminar will examine such decisions as Lee v. Weisman, which held that it was unconstitutional for clergy to offer graduation remarks at public schools and will contrast it with Rosenberger v. Rectors of the University of Virginia, which allowed public funds to be used to publish an evangelical student newspaper. The Rosenberger case is especially interesting because it was decided not on First Amendment grounds (that is, whether the provision of public funds for a religious newspaper violates the Establishment Clause) but on Fourteenth Amendment grounds (that is, whether denying evangelicals funds that are available to non-religious students constitutes discrimination against them). Can liberals, who generally support separation of church and state, be unconsciously supporting discrimination? If conservatives adopt Fourteenth Amendment grounds for religion in public life, can they then oppose strong efforts to overcome racial or gender discrimination?
This week will also examine in some detail cases involving school vouchers, such as the Zelman decision, which gave the green light to a school voucher program in Cleveland. School vouchers are a particularly good example to be used in the seminar, not only because the cases are difficult to resolve, but because such scholars as Nancy Rosenblum, Michael Perry, Richard Mouw and Martha Minow (along with Amy Gutmann and Stephen Macedo) contributed to a book I edited called School Choice: The Moral Debate (Princeton University Press, 2003), which explores all these issues. I plan to invite a legal scholar who has worked in this area to join the seminar for one of these discussions. John Garvey, the Dean of the Boston College Law School, is a person with whom I have worked in many capacities, and is the best person for this purpose. It has been my experience with previous NEH summer seminars that non-lawyers benefit greatly reading and discussing U. S. Supreme Court cases. In addition, Jay Wexler of the Boston University Law School has contributed in this capacity in the past.
In this week of the seminar, we will ask whether the attempts by the Court to reach a consistent jurisprudence in this area are doomed to failure because, as MacIntyre and others would argue, there is no common position to be found. Or is the problem that those who adhere to separation of church and state, recognizing that their position might be unpopular in the country as a whole, have been reluctant to follow constitutional logic where it ought to lead? The legal questions are important in the context of the seminar because they deal so directly with contemporary realities. Even if a common morality is possible in the face of religious differences, and even if the contemporary sociology of religion were to make possible such a common morality, would it matter if those conditions could not be translated into legal rules that would be accepted as legitimate by all, or at least by most, people in the society?
The fifth week will allow participants to present their projects and to receive feedback from other participants. The fifth week will also offer an opportunity for participants with special expertise in the subjects we have been discussing to lead discussions and to frame questions for the other participants.
The sixth and final week of the seminar will seek to bring all the material together by reading Gene Outka’s Prospects for a Common Morality, which contains a number of essays that are generally optimistic toward the prospects for a common morality, as well as The Culture of Disbelief by Yale law professor Steven Carter, which tends to be more pessimistic. This issue has also been addressed with considerable insight by David Hollenbach, S. J. from Boston College’s theology department, who will be invited to address the seminar. It is also a question to which I devote myself in the final chapter of The Transformation of American Religion.
Readers of this letter may be interested in my qualifications for offering this seminar. I have led NEH summer seminars for College Teachers in 1994, 1996, 1999, 2005 and 2007. In the years since my previous ones, I have published One Nation After All: What Americans Really Think about God, Country, Family, Racism, Welfare, Immigration, Homosexuality, Work, The Right, The Left, and Each Other and Moral Freedom: The Search for Virtue in a World of Choice, both of which were widely discussed in both the print and televised media. After these books were published, two developments strengthened my fascination with the subject of religion. One is that religion itself became so much more visible in American life, as politicians talked about God, debates over issues such as gay rights intensified, proposals were offered for faith-based initiatives, and an act inspired by religion resulted in 3000 deaths on American soil. The other is that religion as a field of study in the academy, after a long period of decline, went through an important revival in the past two decades, including fields in the social sciences that, out of a misplaced understanding of objectivity, had generally ignored the subject.
My interest in religion led to a cover story in the October 2000 issue of The Atlantic Monthly, “The Opening of the Evangelical Mind” and that article, in turn, led me to the research that resulted in The Transformation of American Religion. Since that time I have written extensively on American politics. My book The Future of Liberalism will be published by Alfred Knopf in February 2009 and contains material directly relevant to this seminar. I am currently in the initial stages of writing a book about the nature of political evil. I am currently chairing a task force of the American Political Science Association on “Religion and Democracy in the United States” which brings together the insights of fourteen top scholars in the field to address an issue of national significance. One of the task force members is a previous NEH Summer Seminar Participant.
It is also relevant for this seminar to note that I am the director of Boston College’s Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life. This Center engages in research and public activities concerning religion’s role in American society in a non-partisan and independent manner. Although regular programs of the Center will not be taking place during the summer, the experiences I have had in organizing and leading summer institutes for Islamic scholars from the Muslim world under the auspices of the U. S. Department of State have provided experiences worth sharing to the potential participants of an NEH Summer Seminar. A description of the Boisi Center and an account of our activities can be found at: http://www.bc.edu/centers/boisi/coursesandseminars/state_department_seminars.html. The Boisi Center’s last major project was a conference on gambling and the American moral landscape, information about which is contained here: http://www.bc.edu/centers/boisi/publicevents/browse_events_by_date/f07/gambling.html.
We will be meeting at Boston College. BC is a coeducational university with an enrollment of 8,700 undergraduate and 4,500 graduate students. Founded in 1863, it is one of the oldest Jesuit, Catholic universities in the United States. Boston College supports more than 50 fields of study through 11 schools and colleges. The university's 115-acre main campus is located in an open suburban setting six miles from downtown Boston, with direct access to the city via trolley. All participants will have official status, most likely as visiting scholars, at Boston College.
Boston College is a member of the Association of Research Libraries and its combined libraries, including the Thomas P. O'Neill Memorial library, has a collection that recently passed two million volumes. Seminar participants will have full library privileges, including lending privileges with a consortium of Boston area colleges through the Interlibrary Loan department. Participants will also have access to group study rooms, computers, on-line electronic databases, and a computerized search catalog within the library. The library is currently open from 8 am to 1 am on weekdays, 9am to 10pm on Saturdays and 11am to 1am on Sundays.
We have made arrangements so that on campus, air conditioned housing will be available at subsidized rates to seminar participants on a weekly basis. The rooms offered to us are suites designed for four students, but because students are not living in them during the summer, each participant will have their own bedroom while sharing the living room and kitchen in the suite. They will also have access to on campus dining facilities or a wide array of eating establishments in the neighborhood. Participants who bring their families, or who prefer off-campus housing, will be able to access the on-line resources of the Boston College housing office which can help them identify short term off campus housing alternatives for both singles and families during the summer. I understand how important housing issues can be in insuring a positive experience for participants, and I feel confident that Boston College appreciates my concern.
The seminar will be held at the Boisi Center and participants will have access to phones, email, computers, photocopying, and limited secretarial support during their stay. The Boisi Center is located in a 1920s-Tudor style house adjacent to the main campus, giving us the advantage of a central location.
Participants will be able to enjoy the benefits of the greater Boston area during the summer. I will host at least two social gatherings, one at my home in Brookline and the other at my summer house on Cape Cod. The group can also meet informally for picnics and for outings to Boston’s wide offerings of summer events. We will plan on holding a concluding event, most likely a dinner. Information about concerts and art exhibits can be provided to seminar participants in advance of their arrival.
Application information is included as an attachment to this e-mail. Your completed application should be postmarked no later than March 2, 2009, and should be addressed as follows:
Alan Wolfe
Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life
Boston College
24 Quincy Road
Chestnut Hill, MA 02467
Perhaps the most important part of the application is the essay that must be submitted as part of the complete application. The essay should include any personal and academic information that is relevant; reasons for applying to the seminar; your interest, both intellectual and personal, in the topic; qualifications to do the work of the project and make a contribution to it; what you hope to accomplish by participation, including any individual research and writing projects; and the relation of the study to your teaching.
Thank you for your interest in the seminar.
Sincerely,
Alan Wolfe