Download or read book Rediscovering the Religious Factor in American Politics written by David C. Leege and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-09-16 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text addresses whether and how religion and religious institutions affect American politics. For some time, analysts have argued that the conflicts of the New Deal era rendered cultural differences trivial and placed economic interests at the top of the political agenda. The authors and their collaborators - John C. Green, James L. Guth, Ted G. Jelen, Corwin E. Smidt, Kenneth D. Wald, Michael R. Welch, and Clyde Wilcox - disagree. They find that religious worldviews are still insinuated in American political institutions, and religious institutions still are points of reference. The book profits from the new religiosity measures employed in the 1990 National Election Studies. Part 1 discusses the study of religion in the context of politics. Part II examines religion as a source of group orientation. Part III takes up religious practices and their political ramifications. Part IV does the same for doctrinal and worldview considerations. Part V explores the sources of religious socialisation. In conclusion, Part VI reviews the research on religion and political behaviour and looks ahead to where work should proceed.
Download or read book Secular Surge written by David E. Campbell and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2020-12-03 with total page 269 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: American society is rapidly secularizing–a radical departure from its historically high level of religiosity–and politics is a big part of the reason. Just as, forty years ago, the Religious Right arose as a new political movement, today secularism is gaining traction as a distinct and politically energized identity. This book examines the political causes and political consequences of this secular surge, drawing on a wealth of original data. The authors show that secular identity is in part a reaction to the Religious Right. However, while the political impact of secularism is profound, there may not yet be a Secular Left to counterbalance the Religious Right. Secularism has introduced new tensions within the Democratic Party while adding oxygen to political polarization between Democrats and Republicans. Still there may be opportunities to reach common ground if politicians seek to forge coalitions that encompass both secular and religious Americans.
Download or read book Religion and American Politics written by Mark A. Noll and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2007-09-13 with total page 520 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do religion and politics interact in America? How has that relationship changed over time? Why have American religious and political thought sometimes developed along a parallell course while at other times they have moved in opposite directions? These are among the many important and fascinating questions addressed in this volume. Originally published in 1990 as Religion and American Politics: From The Colonial Period to the 1980s (4921 paperback copies sold), this book offers the first comprehensive survey of the relationship between religion and politics in America. It features a stellar lineup of scholars, including Richard Carwardine, Nathan Hatch, Daniel Walker Howe, George Marsden, Martin Marty, Harry Stout, John Wilson, Robert Wuthnow, and Bertram Wyatt-Brown. Since its publication, the influence of religion on American politics--and, therefore, interest in the topic--has grown exponentially. For this new edition, Mark Noll and new co-editor Luke Harlow offer a completely new introduction, and also commission several new pieces and eliminate several that are now out of date. The resulting book offers a historically-grounded approach to one of the most divisive issues of our time, and serves a wide variety of courses in religious studies, history, and politics.
Download or read book Catholics and Politics written by Kristin E. Heyer and published by Georgetown University Press. This book was released on 2008-10-29 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Catholic political identity and engagement defy categorization. The complexities of political realities and the human nature of such institutions as church and government often produce a more fractured reality than the pure unity depicted in doctrine. Yet, in 2003 under the leadership of then-prefect Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI), the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a "Doctrinal Note on Some Questions Regarding the Participation of Catholics in Political Life." The note explicitly asserts, "The Christian faith is an integral unity, and thus it is incoherent to isolate some particular element to the detriment of the whole of Catholic doctrine. A political commitment to a single isolated aspect of the Church's social doctrine does not exhaust one's responsibility toward the common good." Catholics and Politics takes up the political and theological significance of this "integral unity," the universal scope of Catholic concern that can make for strange political bedfellows, confound predictable voting patterns, and leave the church poised to critique narrowly partisan agendas across the spectrum. Catholics and Politics depicts the ambivalent character of Catholics' mainstream "arrival" in the U.S. over the past forty years, integrating social scientific, historical and moral accounts of persistent tensions between faith and power. Divided into four parts—Catholic Leaders in U.S. Politics; The Catholic Public; Catholics and the Federal Government; and International Policy and the Vatican—it describes the implications of Catholic universalism for voting patterns, international policymaking, and partisan alliances. The book reveals complex intersections of Catholicism and politics and the new opportunities for influence and risks of cooptation of political power produced by these shifts. Contributors include political scientists, ethicists, and theologians. The book will be of interest to scholars in political science, religious studies, and Christian ethics and all lay Catholics interested in gaining a deeper understanding of the tensions that can exist between church doctrine and partisan politics.
Download or read book Religion in American Politics written by Frank Lambert and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2010-02-01 with total page 309 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The delegates to the 1787 Constitutional Convention blocked the establishment of Christianity as a national religion. But they could not keep religion out of American politics. From the election of 1800, when Federalist clergymen charged that deist Thomas Jefferson was unfit to lead a "Christian nation," to today, when some Democrats want to embrace the so-called Religious Left in order to compete with the Republicans and the Religious Right, religion has always been part of American politics. In Religion in American Politics, Frank Lambert tells the fascinating story of the uneasy relations between religion and politics from the founding to the twenty-first century. Lambert examines how antebellum Protestant unity was challenged by sectionalism as both North and South invoked religious justification; how Andrew Carnegie's "Gospel of Wealth" competed with the anticapitalist "Social Gospel" during postwar industrialization; how the civil rights movement was perhaps the most effective religious intervention in politics in American history; and how the alliance between the Republican Party and the Religious Right has, in many ways, realized the founders' fears of religious-political electoral coalitions. In these and other cases, Lambert shows that religion became sectarian and partisan whenever it entered the political fray, and that religious agendas have always mixed with nonreligious ones. Religion in American Politics brings rare historical perspective and insight to a subject that was just as important--and controversial--in 1776 as it is today.
Download or read book Religious Ideology in American Politics written by Nicole Guétin and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2014-01-10 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The connections between religion and political discourse in the arena of American politics are profound and longstanding. By looking at the writings of American thinkers from colonial times to the present, this work argues for the consistency and permanence of the American religious vision as it relates to political life. Ideas including Manifest Destiny, America as "God's Country" and Americans as "God's People" are explored within this framework, as is how these ideals of American exceptionalism and the "City on the Hill" have survived and mutated into the current U.S. political climate. Instructors considering this book for use in a course may request an examination copy here.
Download or read book Religion and Politics in America written by Allen D. Hertzke and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-08-06 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Religion and politics are never far from the headlines, but their relationship remains complex and often confusing. This book offers an engaging, accessible, and balanced treatment of religion in American politics. It explores the historical, cultural, and legal contexts that motivate religious political engagement and assesses the pragmatic and strategic political realities that religious organizations and people face. Incorporating the best and most current scholarship, the authors examine the evolving politics of Roman Catholics; evangelical and mainline Protestants; African-American and Latino traditions; Jews, Muslims, and other religious minorities; recent immigrants and religious "nones"; and other conventional and not-so-conventional American religious movements. New to the Sixth Edition • Covers the 2016 election and assesses the role of religion from Obama to Trump. • Expands substantially on religion’s relationship to gender and sexuality, race, ethnicity, and class, and features the role of social media in religious mobilization. • Adds discussion questions at the end of every chapter, to help students gain deeper understanding of the subject. • Adds a new concluding chapter on the normative issues raised by religious political engagement, to stimulate lively discussions.
Download or read book Rediscovering America s Sacred Ground written by Barbara A. McGraw and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 2012-02-01 with total page 266 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Returning to the ideas of John Locke and the Founders themselves, Barbara A. McGraw examines the debate about the role of religion in American public life and unravels the confounded rhetoric on all sides. She reveals that no group has been standing on proper ground and that all sides have misused terminology (religion/secular), dichotomies (public/private), and concepts (separation of church and state) in ways that have little relevance to the original intentions of the Founders. She rediscovers a theology underlying the founding documents of the nation that is neither anyone's particular religion nor one requiring religion. Instead, it justifies freedom of conscience for all and provides a two-tiered public forum—a civic public forum and a conscientious public forum—for the debate itself and the actions that debate inspires. America's Sacred Ground—this theology and its public forum—determines the meaning of freedom and the ways in which Americans can pursue "the good": good government, good communities, good families, good relations between individuals, and good individuals from a plurality of perspectives. By exploring our past, McGraw answers the critical question, Who are we as a people and what do we stand for?
Download or read book The Future of Religion in American Politics written by Charles Dunn and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2010-09-12 with total page 282 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Should parents receive vouchers to send their children to religious schools? What limits—if any—should the government place on abortion? Should the government permit and fund stem cell research? Should religious organizations have the right to prohibit the employment of homosexuals? Should public schools teach both creationism and evolution? How does religion influence our political stances on gay marriage? The death penalty? Immigration? The issues are real. The emotions are intense. The solutions are difficult to reach and often problematic. From the White House to the courthouse, from governors’ mansions to the United States Supreme Court, religion factors into many contemporary legal controversies. Efforts to establish the proper balance between church and state create heated debates in America and raise seemingly insoluble questions. Politicians and their advisers walk a fine line when addressing religious issues in an increasingly pluralistic society where religious factions attempt to impose their values on the electoral and legislative processes. The Future of Religion in American Politics presents thoughtful, wide-ranging essays by twelve eminent public intellectuals and scholars, offering rich and stimulating views on one of the most divisive issues of our time. Editor Charles W. Dunn and the contributors assess the impact of religion on American politics in four distinct time periods: the founding, the Civil War, the New Deal era, and the modern era. Dunn out lines seven propositions that characterize the interaction of religion and politics during these time periods and describes how and why religion continues to influence politics in America. Contributors to this volume argue that whereas religion in the founding era held society together in a shared belief of the biblical portrayal of humanity, today’s pluralistic religious interpretations of God appear to be tearing society apart. The rise of Islam and other world religions poses perplexing questions about the issue of tolerance. Can America survive as a free society without commonly accepted morals that are based in religion? Is America a secular society with a clear separation of church and state, or a government created and informed by ever-changing religious values? The Future of Religion in American Politics includes essays about religion in the public square, evangelical, and faith-based politics in presidential elections. The authors investigate many thought–provoking questions about the extent of religious influence in the U.S. government today and its likely impact in the future. Lucid and accessible, this book covers a wide range of issues and will be invaluable to students of politics, religious studies, and history.
Download or read book Religion and Politics in the United States written by Kenneth D. Wald and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Religion and Politics in the United States, Fifth Edition, offers a comprehensive account of the role of religious ideas, institutions, and communities in American public life. While maintaining that religion is too politically potent to be left out or consigned to the margins in accounts of American politics, Wald and Calhoun-Brown also argue against the common tendency to treat religion as the dominant force in politics today. Early topics include the nature and persistence of religion in the United States, its contribution to the Founding, and the continuing debate over the role of religion in government and law. Following a discussion of how religious factors encourage political action, the book concludes by discussing basic political attitudes and behavior among members of mainstream American religious traditions and minority religious communities defined by ethnicity, race, gender, and sexual orientation. The new edition greatly expands coverage of various religious minorities with a new chapter on politics and religion among African-Americans, Latinos, Muslim Americans, Latter Day Saints (Mormons), and other faith traditions. There is larger focus on how religion influences the politics of local communities.
Download or read book Religion and Politics in America written by Robert Booth Fowler and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-05-04 with total page 362 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Religion and politics are never far from the headlines, but their relationship remains complex and often confusing. In this fifth edition of Religion and Politics in America, the authors offer a lively, accessible, and balanced treatment of religion in American politics. They explore the historical, cultural, and legal contexts that underlie religious political engagement while also highlighting the pragmatic and strategic political realities that religious organizations and people face. Incorporating the best and most up-to-date scholarship, the authors assess the politics of Roman Catholics; evangelical, mainline, and African American Protestants; Jews; Muslims and other conventional and not-so-conventional American religious movements. The author team also examines important subjects concerning religion and its relationship to gender, race/ethnicity, and class. The fifth edition has been revised to include the 2012 elections, in particular Mitt Romney's candidacy and Mormonism, as well as a fuller assessment of the role of religion in President Obama's first term. In-depth treatment of core topics, contemporary case studies, and useful focus-study boxes, provides students with a real understanding of how religion and politics relate in practice and makes this fifth edition essential reading for courses in political science, religion, and sociology departments.
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Religion and American Politics written by Corwin Smidt and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2009-08-19 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Religion is, and has always been, a powerful force in American politics. Over the past three decades, the study of religion and politics has gone from being ignored by the scholarly community to being a major focus of research. Yet, because this important research is not easily accessible to nonspecialists, much of the analysis of religion's role in the political arena that we read in the media is greatly oversimplified. This Handbook seeks to bridge that gap by examining the considerable research that has been conducted to this point and assessing what has been learned, what remains unsettled due to conflicting research findings, and what important questions remain largely unaddressed by current research endeavors. This volume enlists noted scholars in the field to write essays that examine a particular subject area that: (a) assess the "state of the art" within that area; (b) review important findings, insights, and theoretical advances; (c) outline the current debates that engage scholarly attention; and, (d) raise some important, but currently understudied, questions. Thus, the authors review previous work, explain the findings of that research, and speculate about the bases of the various findings related to that topic, with each essay containing an excellent bibliography. The Handbook is unique to the field of religion and American politics and should be of wide interest to scholars, students, journalists, and others interested in the American political scene.
Download or read book The Diminishing Divide written by Andrew Kohut and published by Brookings Institution Press. This book was released on 2001-09-19 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution forbids the creation of an official state church, and we hear the phrase "separation of church and state" so frequently that it may surprise us to note that no such barrier exists between religion and politics. Religion is, and always has been, woven into the fabric of American political life. In the last two decades, however, the role of religion in politics has become more direct—almost a blunt, self-conscious force in the political process. The national consequences of this "diminishing divide" between religion and politics have brought new groups into politics, altered party coalitions, and influenced campaigns and election results. Churches and other religious institutions have become more actively engaged in the political process, and religious people have increased the level and broadened the range of their political participation. While the public is more accepting of the role of religion in shaping today's political landscape, the issue of how much political power certain religious groups enjoy continues to provoke concern.Drawing on extensive survey data from the Pew Research Center, the National Election Studies, and other sources, The Diminishing Divide illuminates the historical relationship between religion and politics in the United States and explores the ways in which religion will continue to alter the political landscape in the century before us. A historical overview of religion in U.S. politics sets the tone as the book examines the patchwork quilt of American religion and the changing role of religious institutions in American political life since the 1960s. The book explores the complex relations between religion and political attitudes, as well as that of religion and political behavior—particularly with respect to party affiliation and voting habits. Finally, The Diminishing Divide offers a look at the future. As candidates and elected officials increasingly air their personal faith in pub
Download or read book Religion and American Foreign Policy 1945 1960 written by William Inboden and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2010-03-31 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Cold War was in many ways a religious war. Presidents Truman and Eisenhower and other American leaders believed that human rights and freedoms were endowed by God, that God had called the United States to defend liberty in the world, and that Soviet communism was especially evil because of its atheism and its enmity to religion. Along with security and economic concerns, these religious convictions also helped determine both how the United States defined the enemy and how it fought the conflict. Meanwhile, American Protestant churches failed to seize the moment. Internal differences over theology and politics, and resistance to cooperation with Catholics and Jews, hindered Protestant leaders domestically and internationally. Frustrated by these internecine disputes, Truman and Eisenhower attempted instead to construct a new civil religion. This public theology was used to mobilize domestic support for Cold War measures, to determine the strategic boundaries of containment, to appeal to people of all religious faiths around the world to unite against communism, and to undermine the authority of communist governments within their own countries.
Download or read book The Christian Right in American Politics written by John C. Green and published by Georgetown University Press. This book was released on 2003-05-06 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the first rumblings of the Moral Majority over twenty years ago, the Christian Right has been marshalling its forces and maneuvering its troops in an effort to re-shape the landscape of American politics. It has fascinated social scientists and journalists as the first right-wing social movement in postwar America to achieve significant political and popular support, and it has repeatedly defied those who would step up to write its obituary. In 2000, while many touted the demise of the Christian Coalition, the broader undercurrents of the movement were instrumental in helping George W. Bush win the GOP nomination and the White House. Bush repaid that swell of support by choosing Senator John Ashcroft, once the movement's favored presidential candidate, as attorney general. The Christian Right in American Politics, under the direction of three of the nation's leading scholars in the field of religion and politics, recognizing the movement as a force still to be reckoned with, undertakes the important task of making an historical analysis of the Christian Right in state politics during its heyday, 1980 to the millennium. Its twelve chapters, written by outstanding scholars, review the impact and influence of the Christian Right in those states where it has had its most significant presence: South Carolina, Virginia, Texas, Florida, Michigan, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Colorado, California, Maine, and Oregon and Washington. Since 1980, scholars have learned a good deal about the social characteristics, religious doctrine, and political beliefs of activists in and supporters of the Christian Right in these states, and each contribution is based on rigorous, dispassionate scholarship. The writers explore the gains and losses of the movement as it attempts to re-shape political landscapes. More precisely, they provide in-depth descriptions of the resources, organizations, and the group ecologies in which the Christian Right operates-the distinct elements that drove the movement forward. As the editors state, "the Christian Right has been engaged in a long and torturous 'march toward the millennium,' from outsider status into the thick of American politics." Those formative years, 1980-2000, are essential for any understanding of this uniquely American social movement. This rigorous analysis over many states and many elections provides the clearest picture yet of the goals, tactics, and hopes of the Christian Right in America.
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Religion and American Politics written by Corwin Smidt and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017 with total page 599 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over the past three decades, the study of religion and politics has gone from being ignored by the scholarly 7ommunity to being a major focus of research. Yet, because this important research is not easily accessible to nonspecialists, much of the analysis of religion's role in the political arena that we read in the media is greatly oversimplified. This Handbook seeks to bridge that gap by examining the considerable research that has been conducted to this point andassessing what has been learned, what remains unsettled due to conflicting research findings, and what important questions remain largely unaddressed by current research endeavors. The Handbook is unique to the field of religion and American politics and should be of wide interest to scholars, students, journalists, and others interested in the American political scene.
Download or read book Finding Faith in Foreign Policy written by Gregorio Bettiza and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2019-06-04 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since the end of the Cold War, religion has become an ever more explicit and systematic focus of US foreign policy across multiple domains. US foreign policymakers, for instance, have been increasingly tasked with monitoring religious freedom and promoting it globally, delivering humanitarian and development aid abroad by drawing on faith-based organizations, fighting global terrorism by seeking to reform Muslim societies and Islamic theologies, and advancing American interests and values more broadly worldwide by engaging with religious actors and dynamics. Simply put, religion has become a major subject and object of American foreign policy in ways that were unimaginable just a few decades ago. In Finding Faith in Foreign Policy, Gregorio Bettiza explains the causes and consequences of this shift by developing an original theoretical framework and drawing upon extensive empirical research and interviews. He argues that American foreign policy and religious forces have become ever more inextricably entangled in an age witnessing a global resurgence of religion and the emergence of a postsecular world society. He further shows how the boundaries between faith and state have been redefined through processes of desecularization in the context of American foreign policy, leading the most powerful state in the international system to intervene and reshape in increasingly sustained ways sacred and secular landscapes around the globe. Drawing from a rich evidentiary base spanning twenty-five years, Finding Faith in Foreign Policy details how a wave of religious enthusiasm has transformed not just American foreign policy, but the entire international system.
