Religion and Politics

Damon Linker has published in   http://www.tnr.com/book/review/what-religion"> The New Republic a well-written and coherently argues review of Ian Buruma’s just published http://press.princeton.edu/titles/9110.html"> ‘Taming the Gods: Religion On Three Continents.”  

Unfortunately, The New Republic does not have a comment option on its website.

Linker takes Buruma to task for what he apparently sees as too broad a definition of religion by supposedly defining it as any strongly held opinion rather than a cluster of beliefs and practices related to the divine or the sacred. Buruma allegedly crosses the line in Linker’s mind when he describes liberal Western anti-Muslim rhetoric as “curiously religious.”

The criticism ignores the degree to which the culture of religion permeates education and culture even I secular societies and as a result also often informs attitudes of secularists and atheists. Examples abound:

a)      a) Turks look down on Arabs whom they ruled for centuries because “the Arabs betrayed us” by supporting the British against the Ottomans in the early part of the 20^th century. Few secular Turks realizes that in using that argument they are employing the Sunni principle that all Muslims belong to the ummah, the community of the faithful, and should not turn against it.

b)      b) Secular and atheist Jews define often define themselves as culturally Jewish even though they do not practice religion

c)  

             c) Puritanism in American politics is religiously inspired

d)     

Th  d) The moral tone in Dutch or Scandinavian foreign policy stems from Calvanism

e)      
Al   e) Alienated or marginalized Diaspora communities as well as communities in conflict zones often hark back to religion as the only framework they can relate to or find solace in.

In his recently published personal memoir of the conflict in Kashmir, http://books.simonandschuster.com/Curfewed-Night/Basharat-Peer/9781439109106">Curfewed Night, Kashmir journalist Basharat Peer describes responses to years of brutal Indian attempts to quash a nationalist insurgency. He writes:

“Shameena and Majid , who had a lost a son, were wading through the painfully slow bureaucratic procedures to find a job for their other son, and they didn’t have enough resources to pay for treatment of their younger son with psychological disorders. All they seemed to have was each other and faith. Hussein, who refused to marry after he was tortured, prayed regularly to find the strength to deal with his predicament. I had seen my parents credit God for saving their lives and increase their prayers after they survived the mine blast. (Dr.) Shahid told me that even the doctors at the crowded psychiatric hospitals recommended a reliance on faith. God and his saints seem to have become the psychiatrists with the largest practice in Kashmir; faith was essentially a support system.” 

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