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This story was written as an assignment for a course in Pluralism at Claremont School of Theology with Professor Richard Amesbury in 2012. Professor Amesbury went on to become the chair in Theological Ethics at the University of Zurich, Switzerland before coming to his current position as Director of the School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies and Professor of Religious Studies and of Philosophy at Arizona State University.
I, however, went on to remain just me.
You will find the footnotes listed at the bottom of the story.
In chapter 4 his 2009 book, The Myth of Religious Violence, William T. Cavanaugh recounts a “cautionary tale” from Martin Marty’s book Politics, Religion, and the Common Good. This “tale” describes the horrendous mistreatment of a number of Jehovah’s Witnesses in the 1940s. The attackers were white Christian Americans in the American mid-west, as were the victims. The men were beaten, tarred and feathered, and even castrated.[1]
This treatment was a result of the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ refusal to salute the American flag. Cavanaugh uses these events as illustrative of the “myth of religious violence,” which “authorizes certain uses of power.”[2] In a nation founded on the precept of religious freedom, it would seem that such violence should not exist. However, as Cavanaugh indicates, such free exercise is not permitted in cases in which it seems that “national cohesion” is threatened.[3]
Much is written about religious violence at a national and international level. National security is at the center of much of the current political rhetoric. According to Cavanaugh, such violence is condemned as reprehensible, while “secular” violence is considered to be “sometimes necessary.”[4] At the core of Cavanaugh’s argument is the idea that there is really no such thing as “religious violence,” but that the concept of “religious violence” is perpetuated as a tool to maintain a tension between a patriotic nationalism in the United States and the threat of other world factions that have not yet “learned the sobering lessons of religious warfare.”[5]
While the discourse about “religious violence” as opposed to “secular violence” at the international level is important, it is also of import to consider the possibility that “religious violence” does exist at another level.
The real myth may be the idea that is known as “separation of church and state.” While the Bill of Rights theoretically guarantees freedom to follow the religion of one’s choice, in practice it seems to mean that one might do so only within the parameters of Christianity. In addition, that Christianity must accept and follow the religious practice of American nationalism. The fabric of the United States seems to be woven with the woof and warp of religion and secularism.
These two aspects of American life are not separate, as the myth suggests. Rich Amesbury writes that “”America” (the nation or people) is conceived of as religious, even though the United States (the state or government) is said to be secular.”[6] America and the United States are woven together into a powerful foundational carpet in which both the religious and the secular are almost inseparable.
The concepts of a “religious America” and a “secular United States” may ring true at the macroscopic level. Certainly, it can explain how it is possible to proclaim “America is a Christian nation,” while at the same time declaring that we live in a nation that practices “separation of church and state.” However, at the microscopic level, in which American life is lived within the United States, one might question the reality of this separation.
The cases of abuse of Jehovah’s Witnesses mentioned at the beginning of this paper involved adult citizens of the United States. These are certainly not the only cases in which adults whose religious practices challenged the status quo were treated badly. Early in American history, as more Roman Catholics entered the United States, they were discriminated against. As Cavanaugh points out, usually when separation of church and state was referenced during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, it was a Protestant version intended to bar government aid to Catholic schools.[7]
As the famous American “Melting Pot” was filled with more cultural and religious variety, there were more incidents of discriminatory behavior. In spite of strides made during the Civil Rights movement, new additions to the “Pot” inspired new fears and new reactions. The attacks on America on September 11, 2001 instigated a new wave of prejudice, fear and mistreatment. In addition, the visibility of alternative religions and of unique ways of perceiving deity has introduced new facets to this already multi-dimensional problem.
The question is no longer simply one of whether or not “church” and “state” are truly separate, but one of what constitutes an acceptable religion. If one does not practice an “acceptable” religion (that is, a religion that fits into the worldview as understood and practiced by the dominant culture), one is at risk of abuse. In “the streets” of twenty-first century religious America, that worldview still consists of a Christian understanding of the universe.
Additionally, it is a worldview that is influenced by the Pentecostal Movement and often informed by fundamentalist televangelists. Out of this worldview comes a judgment of the adherents of other religious beliefs, both within the auspices of Christianity as well as within the ever-increasing pluralist society that is the United States.
Consider the six Muslim Imams who were refused a flight home in 2009, ostensibly because they made “anti-American comments,” although there was no proof of such comments. What they had done, however, was perform their evening prayers in the airport before the flight.[8] Or consider the Wiccan TSA employee who was fired because a co-worker feared she had put a spell on her. Other “official” reasons are given, but news stories make it clear that at least one reason for her firing was her religious preference.[9] After a memorandum about the complaint went out to supervisors without the employee’s knowledge, she began to experience treatment “akin to high school bullying.”[10]
While these incidents involving adults range from physically devastating to emotionally difficult, it is among children that these issues can have their most destructive effects. For a short time during the early part of World War II, the courts decided that it was in the best interest of the nation that all school-age children be indoctrinated into national unity through pledging to the flag. The Supreme Court “upheld the right to inculcate patriotism over the right to free exercise of religion.”[11]
Cavanaugh points out that although the Court decision was reversed in just three years, the idea that enforcement of national unity over religious practice was acceptable. However, underlying these decisions may very well be an invisible tapestry of “Christian secularism;” that is, the understanding of “religious freedom” as long as the religion looks, tastes, and acts like the religion of a “Christian Nation.”
Bullies have been a part of growing up as long as there have been groups of children gathered in one place. Real life is often reflected in children’s literature. Perhaps because writers suffered at the hands of their peers, many beloved childhood stories tell of protagonists who are bullied because they are different from the norm in some way.
For instance, J. K. Rowling’s characters Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger are both bullied; Ron is bullied because he comes from a large, poor family and Hermione is bullied because she is intelligent and comes from a “mixed-blood” family. L. M. Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables is teased relentlessly because her red hair is the color of carrots. Anne’s woes are sadly reflected among today’s youth in Britain.[12]
The reasons a bully becomes a bully are complicated and beyond the scope of this paper. The reason a victim of bullying becomes a victim is that he or she possesses a characteristic that has been targeted as “different” by greater society. This idea is often reinforced in some way by the adults who influence the bully’s thought process. For instance, in Britain, relentless teasing of redheads is thought by some to be “long-standing and uniquely British in its most virulent form.”[13] Bullying can be painful, and the results can be devastating.
In the United States, there have been a number of instances of bullying that are the result of religious prejudice. This prejudice may stem from an expectation that in order to be truly religious and truly American, one must adhere to an understanding of religion that is, at its core, “Christian.” Even in an admittedly “Pluralistic” world, “explicit Christian categories” have been made normative.”[14] If these categories are normative among scholars, where ideas are expounded, discussed, written about and eventually made mainstream through the popular media, how much more “normative” must they be among the populace?
Heim writes, “Many Christians in the past set terms by which other religions must be considered false.”[15] In that past, there was animosity between the adherents of Protestant denominations and Catholics, as well as between both of these Christian groups and Judaism. However, as what Richard Amesbury calls “Multi-Religious” Denominationalism becomes the norm, a new dynamic comes into play. Amesbury writes that
…while it is plainly true that one need not claim a religious affiliation in order to be a citizen in the legal sense, there is reason to believe that the emergence of what might be termed multi-religious denominationalism has actually served to sharpen the moral boundary between “believers” and “nonbelievers,” and it is far from obvious that one can be incorporated through “unbelief.”
In an illuminating study, Penny Edgell et al. found that their respondents ranked atheists first in terms of groups that do “not at all agree with my vision of American society,” followed rather distantly by Muslims, homosexuals, conservative Christians, and recent immigrants.
During the school 2006–2007 school year, 31% of over 25 million students reported being bullied by other students.[16] While the report discusses types of bullying, such as verbal, physical, gossip, or threats as well as the environment and various other breakdowns, there is no section in the report that discusses what the bullying behavior was focused on. In other words, the official reports do not indicate if a child was bullied because of their weight, their perceived intelligence level, their race, gender identity or religious beliefs. However, it is possible to ascertain some of this information through anecdotal information and news reports.
In 2011 and 2012, a teacher of 7th and 8th grade children in Glendale, Arizona were bullied by others because of their religious beliefs. The predominantly Christian Latino students relentlessly teased the one female Muslim student. The school is situated in the middle of two Latino gang territories, and approximately two thirds of the students at the middle school level of the Kindergarten through Eighth grade school are second to fourth generation gang members. Because of the gang activity, students are not allowed to wear the hoods of their sweatshirts over their heads. When they were told to take off the “hoodies,” students were heard yelling at the young Muslim girl to take off her hijab. In addition, they would call her names like “terrorist” throughout the school day.[17]
In a postmodern American society, while those who claim to be “atheist” are deemed to be “bad,” there are some religious beliefs that are considered to even worse by “Christian” norms. In fact, some of these beliefs are considered to be “anti-Christian,” and those who oppose them use biblical rhetoric to slander those who follow such a belief system. Students who follow a Neo-Pagan or Wiccan tradition often find themselves the victims of bullies. One such student was twelve-year-old Tempest Smith.
Tempest completed suicide by hanging herself from her bunk bed in 2001. Tempest wrote in her journal that classmates often crowded around her chanting “Jesus loves you,” and ridiculed her in other ways for her Wiccan beliefs. According to a story in the Detroit News at the time, attorneys for Denessa Smith, Tempest’s mother, claimed that school employees “violated the girl’s civil rights because they knew about the teasing, but did nothing to stop it.” They claimed that the school employees’ inaction contributed to Tempest’s death.[18]
The Jehovah’s Witnesses who were attacked in the 1940s were Christians whose firm belief was that pledging the allegiance to the US flag was idolatry. This put them in danger, both at the hands of other Christians, but also at the hands of the state. Their right to exercise their faith was denied them, not only because it was considered “un-Christian” to refuse to salute the flag, but also because the courts at that time made pledging to the flag compulsory.
Cavanaugh argues that the “Myth of Religious Violence” sets up a situation in which violence which is driven by religious purpose is “condemnable,” but violence that on behalf of the Western nation-state is not only sometimes necessary but often commendable. As such, he writes, the myth is false. This false myth has had a significant negative impact and should be “retired.”[19]
If it is possible to retire the myth and thus end the fear of the “other” that accompanies the myth, there would be fewer justifications for wars against those whose leadership falls under the auspices of religion. If such a change were to take place at the national level, thus affecting the behaviors of political entities in the international arena, would such a change trickle down to the populace?
Would fear of “the other” be abated, thus eventually rendering hate crimes, mistreatment of others and juvenile bullying obsolete?
© Suzy Jacobson Cherry 19 March 2012
