Abstract
In this edited volume, the authors do a great service to scholars of religion and social change by bringing needed attention to the often invisible religious underpinnings of progressive civic and political engagement. In response to the media's commonplace portrayal of religious politics as that of the Religious Right, which is often shown in contrast to the secular Left, these authors showcase various examples of religiously influenced progressive activism. They map out key contours of this often unrecognized field, showing how progressive religious activism is influenced both by the secular Left and religious Right, yet distinctive from each of these groups in pursuing change through religiously inspired activism to address stratification and inequality in American society.
Progressive activism is often not visible to the media or to the public for several reasons. First, religious activists may not call themselves “liberal,” “progressive,” or “left-wing” (p. 7). Second, in addition to a self-declared identity (or lack thereof), there are a number of dimensions that can make a person a “conservative” or “progressive” activist. One's ideological orientation can be assessed based on religious approach or one of any number of political preferences. An individual or group's ideological orientations may include a mix of support for supposedly progressive and conservative tenets, such as support for reducing inequality and pro-choice beliefs. In addition, conservative values (e.g. “traditional” evangelical religious morals) can be used to support a progressive political agenda (such as civil rights), or vice versa. Furthermore, one can also define activists based on whether they invoke conservative or progressive values, whether they engage in actions to initiate social change in broader society, or whether they seek to change religious faith traditions from the inside.
Because much religiously influenced progressive activism is nuanced and not ostensibly labelled as such, the authors of this volume wisely chose to identify “mechanisms through which faith communities politicize religious talk, practices and identities,” to show “how seemingly neutral acts of civic engagement… promote larger moral visions for society” (8). By doing so, they unearth various cases of religiously motivated progressive activism which might not be evident to the untrained eye.
This book provides important contributions to scholarship on religious activism by mapping out various dimensions of the field of religiously-influenced progressive activism (Part I), and identifying how this field is distinct from the Religious Right or the field of secular progressives. The authors conclude that the field of religious progressive activism differs from that of religious conservatives and secular progressives in that its members and organizations: (1) often do not identify themselves with the field, and lack a shared collective consciousness with others doing similar work, (2) do not have a close relationship with their affiliated political party—the Democratic Party—which is led by secular progressives, and (3) differ from conservative religious groups in valuing and maintaining organizational diversity as a foundational element of their work. In particular, progressive religious organizations and coalitions tend to have much more religious, racial, and socioeconomic diversity than either conservative religious political groups or secular progressive groups. Consequently, others can learn from these groups how they bridge numerous different participants’ cultural backgrounds, experiences, and interests (Chapter 1 by Fulton and Wood and Chapter 6 by Diaz-Edelman) through the use of various tactics (e.g. Chapters 13–15 by Braunstein, Adler, and Fuist).
Ultimately, as Rhys Williams underscores in the Conclusion, this volume points to another reason why progressive religious activism often flies under the radar, yet is important to study: it is emergent, dynamic, and often occurs outside of or in the interstices between formal congregations and activist organizations. In contrast to the Religious Right or to some organizational champions of secular liberals, such as the Democratic Party, progressive activism often occurs in the “fluidity of networks and relationships… [that] often coalesce for a period into groups with names and some formal structure, but they just as often dissolve, rearrange, and reform” (p. 256 c.f. Moore 2008). Encouraged by this book (see also Chapter 10 by Yukich), scholars should turn in the direction of investigating the social spaces in which lived religion, morality, and activism overlap, to continue developing understandings of progressive religious activism in the United States and elsewhere. Although I think this book could have better developed a theoretical map for future scholarship, as is it takes great strides by pointing scholars and others to an often unnoticed and underappreciated field of progressive religious activism in America. Future research on both progressive and conservative religious activism should build upon the many contributions of this volume.