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This blog post was submitted by Nicholas R. Lang, a senior at DePaul University. Nick serves as Media Intern for the Interfaith Youth Core and is a resident of the Vincent and Louise House on campus. He is also a co-founder and co-president of DePaul A.V. Club.
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How much do you know about your own religion? What about the beliefs of other faiths? According to a recent Pew Research Study, the answer may be not much. Although atheists and agnostics scored slightly higher than other faith traditions, polled Americans averaged a score of 50% on questions about a number of faith traditions. Less than 40% of Americans were able to correctly recognize Vishnu and Shiva as Hindu figures. Not even half could correctly identify the religion of the Dalai Lama.
Interestingly, Catholics fared the worst of any faith tradition on questions pertaining to the Bible and Christianity, and Christians scored only slightly better than the average. In the report, Pew goes further: 43% of Jews were unaware “that Maimonides, one of the most venerated Rabbis in history, was Jewish.” Only half of Protestants recognized Martin Luther as the thinker whose writings inspired the Protestant Reformation.
According to the Chicago Council of Global Affairs, these statistics speak to the widespread religious illiteracy in American life. In a recent report, the CCGA felt that this was a problem of American education, writing that we must do a better job of teaching our students about religion. A Council study published earlier this year, entitled “Engaging Religious Communities Abroad,” went deeper into the problem. The report found religious literacy to be central to American life and key to how our country enacts its foreign policy.
Responding to this latter motif in the CCGA report, Political Science professor Dr. Scott Hibbard states that this religious illiteracy has a number of international implications. “If a population is not well versed with its own faith traditions…then they are going to be more susceptible to the manipulation of religions for political ends. If they don’t know other traditions, they will be willing to accept any kind of claim made about that tradition, whether it is rooted in fact or not….The demonization of Islam by writers such as Robert Spencer has been and continues to be used to justify adventurous policies abroad and discriminatory policies at home. “
Foreign policy analysts often refer to this as America’s “God gap,” defined by Washington post columnist David Waters as a brand of Western religious culture “that fails to engage and encourage religious groups that promote peace, human rights and the general welfare of their communities.” Although Waters speaks of the God Gap as a challenge for American society, Interfaith Scholar Nic Cable feels we must engage it, as “religious literacy is at the heart of building a truly pluralistic society.”
As a junior Religious Studies student committed to religious pluralism, he finds the God Gap to be a danger for today’s society. “We are the most religiously diverse country in the world and this calls for us to come together to affirm the importance of religious freedom and common humanity. The religious makeup of this country today…is growing more diverse every day. We need to train younger generations in a vocabulary that is inclusive to people of different backgrounds, both ethnically and religiously. This is critical to creating harmony in society.”
The CCGA indicated that this harmony begins with education. If this is true, then Secular Humanist Huffington Post columnist Chris Stedman feels our schools are, as the Pew scores indicated, failing us. “If the beliefs of our neighbors impact how they negotiate public life, we need to know what they believe and how it informs their everyday lives. The separation between ‘church and state’ is a bedrock American principle and should absolutely be upheld. But the hyper-sensitivity over ‘separation of church and state’ has resulted in a feeling that religion should be completely removed from education. We are churning out young people who know little about the diversity that permeates society.”
Although this may be the case nationally, Religious Studies professor Dr. David Wellman does not find DePaul to be a religiously illiterate institution. Established in 1898 by Vincentian Priests, Wellman states that DePaul’s founders “designed [the Vincentian institution] from its inception to promote religious literacy by a commitment to inclusivity.” In regards to pluralism, Wellman finds in the university “an emerging definition of Vincentianism that opens the door for Vincentian Jews, Protestants, Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus.”
For Vincent and Louise House coordinator Pauline Villapando, DePaul commits to fostering pluralism and religious literacy through its vast array extracurricular and academic offerings. However, Villapando “only [sees] a small population of students taking advantage of [them].” According to her, “the responsibility equally lies in students to choose to engage in these university offerings.” Villapando states that this is likely due to “peer pressure, apathy, [and] busyness” among the student population.
However, Nic Cable feels “there is much more that can be done” in fostering religious understanding amongst DePaul’s student population. Cable recommends “more intensive trainings for staff, faculty, and student leaders regarding this subject.” Sophomore Philosophy major Andrew Tripp, President of the DePaul Alliance for Free Thought, likewise agrees that fostering religious literacy is necessary, if only to understand “ the inherent inanities and dangers and intolerance that religion espouses.”
But despite Tripp’s dislike of religion, he will “always respect the right for someone to believe in [it],” even if he “cannot respect the beliefs themselves.” Although he identifies as an atheist, Tripp feels “it’s always a good idea to understand where one’s neighbor is coming from.”
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Sources:
Chicago Council on Global Affairs: “Religion and the Making of U.S. Foreign Policy”
Pew Research: “U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey”
Washington Post: “American foreign policy’s God gap”