REL 130 Chapter Notes - Chapter 1: American Civil Religion, Civil Religion, World War I

• School: University of Alabama
• Department: Religious Studies
• Course: REL 130
• Professor: altman

Document Summary

Argument: there is a civil religion in america and that it has its own seriousness and integrity and requires the same care and understanding that any other religion does. It might be argued that the passages in this speech that talk about god reveal the essentially irrelevant role of religion in the very secular society of america. The placing of the references in this speech and in public life generally indicates that religio(cid:374) has (cid:862)o(cid:374)ly a (cid:272)ere(cid:373)o(cid:374)ial sig(cid:374)ifi(cid:272)a(cid:374)(cid:272)e. (cid:863) It might be countered that the very way in which kennedy made these references reveals the essentially vestigial place of religion today. This public religious dimension is expressed in a set of beliefs, symbols, and rituals that i am calling the american civil religion. Simple dogmas of civil religion (rousseau: the existence of god, the life to come, the reward of virtue and the punishment of vice, the exclusion of religious intolerance.