by Turkey’s newest crisis pitting secularist plotters against the conservative Islamic government is one of the world’s dramatic examples of the distrust between proponents of clear church-state
divisions and those who believe that religion and politics may be useful or even necessary companions in creating a just and moral society. One of my fall seminar students suggested that the cycle of military coups
in Turkey when army officers decide that religion is damaging the state may simply be Turkey’s distinctive way of navigating church-state issues.
But hearing that news story coupled with Newsweek columnist Lisa Miller’s February 22 description of the Harvard faculty’s opposition to a religious studies requirement, http://www.newsweek.com/id/233413, I was impelled to think about the ubiquitous 9/11 question, “why do they hate us so?” Or more carefully, what is it about the way in which
religious people or those educated to bring religious thought to bear on public issues present themselves in “secular space” that worries, confounds, irritates, or angers those who are not religious?
It is, of course, easy for thoughtful religious people to pooh-pooh the arguments of very smart people like those at Harvard who dismiss religion as worthy of serious intellectual discussion. But few of us bother to probe for the “back story,” the life history that anchors arguments against religion in public life. So what are these stories? I remember Sandy Levinson’s story of being a young Jewish boy in a Christian community where everybody was expected to “go along” with the Christian holiday celebrations and religious songs in public school. Is that the kind of story that impels a Harvard professor to oppose a religion requirement? What kind of story impels a Turkish military officer to plot a coup against his government?
Maybe a story in which Islamic governments in neighboring countries limit religious freedoms, impose religious law, deny women equal social and political rights, etc.?
I’m not sure it’s such a good idea to a suggest a religious “us” and a secular “them,” at least where the religious “us” includes those with some profoundly disturbing views about limiting the rights of religious and non-religious minorities (including women, gays and lesbians, and others).
I think that’s a fair point. My two examples (the product of stream of consciousness, sadly:) are apples and oranges, and we should not conflate the very complex Turkish political and religious situation with our American debate over the inclusion of religion in public space. The way in which religion plays a part in each culture and the consequences of religious intrusion into public life are quite different. To extend the analysis, it’s apples and oranges to compare the Turkish situation to the situation of other predominantly Muslim Middle Eastern countries, all of which have a quite complex and different “take” on the relationship between religion, government, public life and issues of social justice. Tunisia and Saudi Arabia and the Afghanistan of the Taliban, to take just three examples, have very different approaches to the problem of gender equality. Your “us” and “them” point is thus very well taken. The point of my post was to ask religious people to point the finger back at themselves and ask “to what extent am I responsible for the “us/them” mentality occurring in the relatively benign setting of the legal academy as the dangerous and volatile situation of regime change in Turkey?”