American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us by Robert Putnam and David Campbell - Essay Example

? Religion Religion Religion has been a major issue that has unified societies around the world and at the same time divided societies over many years. Complex religious systems around the world have cemented relationships among individuals in sections of the society while the differences that exist between various religious systems have also pitted one particular segment of the society against one another. The extent to which religion creates enmity or solidarity among individuals or between groups of individuals in the society has been extensively studied by different scholars. In their book “American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us”, Robert Putnam and David Campbell present a unique and religiously diverse America as having experienced numerous seismic distresses. The authors explore how religious landscape of America has altered over time and also dig deep into the causes of these alterations in the present American society. It is undisputed that the United States’ peaceful coexistence between individuals of different religions is built on the harmony among individuals of different faiths who do not question the role of any particular religion in America (Putnam & Campbell, 2012). In recent periods, many Christians have questioned the morality and the role of Islamic religion, not only in America, but in other Christian dominated countries around the world in the wake of series of terrorist attacks. These attacks have been majorly associated with the Islamic religion shaking the peaceful coexistence between religions that has long defined happiness and peaceful living. Putnam and Campbell focus on the past fifty years in examining how religion can divide and unite people. As the authors explain, in early centuries, intermarriages between individuals of different denomination were nothing more than a fairy tale. The practice was unwelcome, particularly in Protestant and Catholic denominations. However, in recent periods, the Catholics and Protestants in the United States feel like they all belong to one camp. Putnam and Campbell argue that by 2000s, the denomination in which an individual belonged bore no significance, but how religious a person is had gained great importance as a diving line in politics (Putnam & Campbell, 2012). However, this argument evokes one big question that underlies the present disharmony in peaceful religious coexistence. Everyone would ask why Muslims do not form part of the claimed unified religious family that fits Putnam and Campbell’s description. According to Putnam and Campbell, America’s religious diversity has never entailed extensive religious intolerance. As they explain, coexistence has been ensured through willingness of believers to bend fundamental doctrines so as to foster interfaith amity (Putnam & Campbell, 2012). Most Christians have a conviction that everybody, including non-Christians, can find their way into heaven. In this manner, it is apparent that Christians are bending a crucial doctrine that underlies their religion that no one can ever go to heaven without going through God’s son, Jesus Christ. Putnam and Campbell explain the Americans have become more tolerant because they have on average two friends with different religious backgrounds. In their survey in 2007, Putnam and Campbell ascertained that similar to the evangelicals, the mainstream Protestants, perceived Muslims to be worse than Buddhists. On the other hand, black Protestants perceived Muslims in a more positive way than they did with Buddhists (Putnam & Campbell, 2012). In the latter observation, the result could be attributed to the fact that black Christians are more familiar with their black Muslims counterparts. The authors proceed to explain this scenario by exploring social theory in which they point out factors such as mutual goals as possible causes of familiarity resulting into strong cohesion among individuals of different faiths. Assessing Michael Emerson and Christian Smith's Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America, it appears that religion divides more than it unites people. Even though the fundamental reason for religion is to unify people, Putnam and Campbell’s assertion that religion is no cause of rift between individuals seems not to hold. According to “Divided by Faith”, evangelicals, despite having good intentions, perpetuates social problems that Americans face. A cording to the authors, white evangelicals worsen race problem in the country rather than seek a solution to heal it. Race has been a major line of division among American societies (Emerson & Smith, 2000). The authors of Divided by Faith point at the failure of religion to unify the societies but continue animosity on racial grounds. In the journal “Evolutionary Perspectives on Religion: An Overview and Synthesis” by Zachary Smith and Holly Arrow, the authors define religion “as a set of myths, symbols, beliefs, and practices” (Smith & Arrow, 2010, P.50). These religious aspects are often demonstrated by individuals through morality, social cohesion, emotion as well as explanation (Smith & Arrow, 2010). According to Smith and Arrow, the emphasis on the four tenets varies widely among different religions across the world. As they argue, religion can prove beneficial or harmful to an individual subscriber of a group of people who subscribe to a particular religion. Smith and Arrow utilize different evolutionary theories about religion that attempt to clarify how religion can cement or disintegrate relationships between individuals of the society. The authors present the byproduct theory, which postulates that religion is a byproduct of normal operation nonreligious mental mechanisms emanating from ancestral backgrounds (Smith & Arrow, 2010). The byproduct theory attempts to explain the universality of religion as well as cross-cultural resemblance by exploring cognitive fundamentals as well as other components of social intelligence (Smith & Arrow, 2010). Based on the byproduct theory, religious cognition is considered as a theory of mind, which “allows humans to understand that the mental states of others can be different from their own” (Smith & Arrow, 2010, p.51). When individuals can understand the differences between them, they develop crucial social functioning, which enables them to establish cooperators, liars as well as defectors within a particular religious camp. Religion is an inherent drive that makes people to pursue coalitions and groups. However, the complexity of religion can lead to animosity among individuals or groups within the society. Differences that define various religions across the world lead to divergences in opinion and what constitute morality. As such, people are always fighting each other because of lack of common belief that comes with divergence on religious principles. Further, using individual-level adaptation theory, Smith and Arrow argue that religion is an adaptation that drives people to collaborate and develop altruistic behavior. The authors use Jainism and Buddhism as examples that illustrate the functioning of religion in making people to develop altruistic tendencies. According to the meme theory, religious features and its maladaptive components of religions are passed on to generations through imitation. As it emergence, religion, which is generally supposed to be a unifying factor, can divide people and create amenity between them based on divergence of religious ideologies. References Emerson, M.O. & Smith, C. (2000). Divided by faith: evangelical religion and the problem of race in America. New York: Oxford University Press. Putnam, R.D. & Campbell, D.E. (2012).American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster. Smith, Z. & Arrow, H. (2010). Evolutionary Perspectives on Religion: An Overview and Synthesis. The Journal of the Evolutionary Studies Consortium, 2(2):48-66. Read More