Do We Really Want to Give God Away?

I want us all to be able to identify what Donna Haraway called “the god trick”—or our propensity to accept a broad, sweeping, normative idea as universally true.

One of the key takeaways I’ve gathered from my time studying religion is that any and all efforts that seek to finally undermine the religious right have to examine religion with a much more discerning lens. Otherwise, we risk once again underestimating the powerful role religion can play in mobilizing people to pursue their vision of justice in th... See more

some of our commonly held “wisdoms” around religion are missing crucial context, and in the process, are letting many nefarious forces in this world go unchecked and under-examined. In addition, some of these talking points and universal claims about religion are unintentionally reproducing notions of othering, racism, and Western supremacy—even th... See more

I want us to grasp that religion cannot be relegated to just a private or just a public sphere, but it is an animating force all around us that we give value to.

I want us to resist absolutist or binary claims about religion (ie: “Religion is violent!” “Religion caused all the major wars in the world!”) that release other agents of power from their accountability in the world’s problems.

I want us to better understand our position in the world relative to religion, particularly how our steadfast (if misguided) belief in secularism feeds into the idea of Western supremacy.

I thought I came here to better understand the destructive role that religion plays in the world, so I could fight against it. I didn’t anticipate that, in exploring that work, I’d also come to appreciate the role that faith plays in brokering peace and forging coalitions in a world that’s more divided than ever.

< Note, this is 1/x in a series of essays > 

Religion is just one category of power that is animating our world. In the fight for reproductive justice, for example, religion is accompanied by capitalism (a system reinforced by the traditional family unit and household), sexism (the belief that women’s bodily autonomy should not be determined by women themselves), and the state (which benefits... See more