Genealogy of Religion

Exploring the Origins, History and Future of Religion

Entries Tagged as 'Civil Religion'

Religion in America: The View from Britain

December 18th, 2011 · No Comments · Daily Devolutions

I always find it amusing when our British cousins, being a bit older and often wiser, look at the American scene and feel compelled to give us a gentle reminder or serious lecture. In this case it is a sage reminisce on the Founding Fathers, religion, and politics. The chiding was prompted by the usual [...]

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Catholic Justices Serve Their Master Well

April 7th, 2011 · 2 Comments · Civil Religion, Power

The Catholic boys club that is the United States Supreme Court really outdid themselves in Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization v. Winn (April 4, 2011), a case in which Arizona citizens challenged a state law giving tax credits to those who donate to “school tuition organizations.” These organizations provide scholarships to private schools. Because nearly [...]

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The Holy Constitution

November 9th, 2010 · No Comments · Civil Religion, Daily Devolutions

As Samuel Freedman observes in this article on American politics, religious faith often blends with nationalistic faith to form a kind of civil religion:
“God’s words, the concept of godly government, are woven into the warp and woof of the fabric of our nation and this Constitution. It’s rightly called the Miracle in Philadelphia.”
Mr. Manship’s own [...]

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Slouching Toward Berlin

October 13th, 2010 · 3 Comments · Civil Religion, Economy, Power

Watching Germany grapple with its rough beast is sort of like cultural voyeurism — outsiders are weirdly fascinated even as Germans seem unsure of how to proceed.  Two recent articles in Spiegel offer powerful reminders that gawking, a paradoxical product of attraction and revulsion, can be unsettling.
The first, by Frank Hornig and Michael Sontheimer, discusses [...]

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America’s Civil Religion

September 29th, 2010 · No Comments · Civil Religion, Power

In a previous post, I outlined what the sociologist Robert Bellah calls “civil religion,” and its elaboration by Carolyn Martin and David Ingle in their classic article, “Blood Sacrifice and the Nation: Revisiting Civil Religion.”  Now, Lexington over at The Economist has posted on “The Perils of Constitution Worship.”  Lexington notes that Americans in general [...]

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Christian America and Religious Intolerance

August 11th, 2010 · 1 Comment · Atheism, Axial Age, Civil Religion, Emotions

In an odd article that attempts to situate Anne Rice’s very public proclamation that she is leaving the Catholic Church within the larger context of American Christianity, Los Angeles Times religion reporter William Lobdell makes two apparently contradictory claims:

American Christianity is not well, and there’s evidence to indicate that its condition is more critical [...]

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Ground Zero is “Sacred Ground”

July 21st, 2010 · 1 Comment · Civil Religion, Definitions, Emotions, Power

In yesterday’s post on the religion of nationalism, I noted that Ground Zero is sacred ground for the believer-patriots of American national religion.  If you questioned this assertion, doubt no more — the GOP has produced an incendiary video which declares that Ground Zero is “sacred ground” and that an Islamic mosque cannot be built [...]

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Nationalism as Religion

July 20th, 2010 · 1 Comment · Civil Religion, Classifications, Cultural Evolution, Definitions, History, New Religions, Power, Ritual

In a previous post, Religious Wars and Nationalism, I discussed two factors that play a major role in group cohesion.  The first factor, which played a dominant role for the majority of human evolution, was extended and fictive kinship.  This is what primarily held groups together during the Paleolithic.  After the Neolithic Revolution, another factor [...]

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Religious Wars and Nationalism

July 18th, 2010 · No Comments · Cultural Evolution, Economy, Evolutionary Adaptation, Evolutionary Byproduct, History, Power

Over at HuffPo Religion, Matt Rossano has written a thought provoking piece — which some may find surprising — on the relationship between war and religion.   In Why Religion Does Not Equal War, Rossano begins with the common knowledge that religious differences often lead to war, or that religious differences are often used to justify [...]

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The Many Functions of Religions

May 17th, 2010 · 6 Comments · Axial Age, Civil Religion, Cognition, Cultural Evolution, Evolutionary Adaptation, Evolutionary Byproduct, History, Morality, Ritual, Shamanism

There is a long history of assessing — and attempting to explain — religion in a functional manner.  Marx and Engels figured that the function of religion was to disguise the realities of the underlying economic system and palliate the suffering of the laboring masses.  Durkheim thought that the function of religion was to enable [...]

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