Diana Eck, professor of comparative religions and Indian studies at Harvard University and Director of its Pluralism Project, published an award-winning book in 2001 titled A New Religious America: How a “Christian Country” has become the World’s Most Religiously Diverse Nation. In that volume, Eck claims and then demonstrates that the United States is now the most pluralistic nation on the globe. No matter where one lives in America, it is typical to encounter people who follow other traditions, or no religious path at all.
Many Americans celebrate this religious and philosophical diversity, realizing that multiple worldviews, values, beliefs and experiences can create a more productive and interesting society. Others, however, fear what differs from the way things used to be, and they long for a return to that time when life was more familiar and comfortable, when America was “great.”
Religious Pluralism Defined
One of the most helpful contributions of Eck’s award-winning book is the way she explains and demystifies the concept of “pluralism.” She writes:
The language of pluralism is the language not just of difference but of engagement, involvement, and participation. It is the language of traffic, exchange, dialogue, and debate. [For some people, ‘pluralism’] has a bad name…. [It means] the chaos of ‘anything goes.’ It means unprincipled relativism and therefore moral decay. It means giving up on one’s own, usually Christian, truth claims in favor of an unconvincing ‘religious correctness.’
However, she explains:
Pluralism is not an ideology, not a leftist scheme, and not a free-form relativism. Rather, pluralism is the dynamic process through which we engage with one another in and through our very deepest differences.
First, pluralism is not just another word for diversity. It goes beyond mere plurality or diversity to active engagement with that plurality….
Second, pluralism goes beyond mere tolerance to the active attempt to understand the other…. Tolerance alone does little to bridge the chasms of stereotypes and fear that may, in fact, dominate the mutual image of the other.
Third, pluralism is not simply watering down differently-held beliefs to the lowest common denominator. It does not displace or eliminate deep religious commitment or secular commitments, for that matter. It is, rather, the encounter of commitments.
When I call myself a pluralist, I am not saying that I endorse a scary relativism, or am merely tolerant of people who are different from me, or water down my beliefs so that somehow they agree with the views of people who follow other spiritual or philosophical paths than I. Rather, I mean I am determined to befriend those who believe differently, so that we can understand each other better and together might work to make the world more just, peaceful and sustainable. This cooperative work will be more effective when we see and address shared problems through our own distinctive religious and ideological commitments.
An Unusual Breakfast
The table was appropriately prepared as we sat down to a meal both kosher and halal. I was meeting the guests seated on either side of me for the first time. To my left was Rabbi David Saperstein, United States Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom under President Obama, and to my right was Sheikh Saleh Abdullah bin Humaid, President of the Consultative Assembly of Saudi Arabia and Imam of the Grand Mosque of Mecca. As a Christian minister and Baptist professor from Texas, and Chair Elect of the convening organization hosting the meal, I sat between them. There we were: a Jew, a Christian, and a Muslim, representing the three great Abrahamic religions – siblings descended from the same Semitic ancestor and each committed to belief in and submission to the One God.
by Frank DiGirolamo
“Wow! … You just listened to my whole anthem.” It was late at night, years ago, on North Broadway in Capitol Hill. “Miguel” had just recited his life story to me for a good 20 minutes…