Erling Pages Index

The Rev. Dr. Maria Erling

 Questions from class, 9/13/04

1. Diversity vs Pluralism
2. What is the history of the separation of Church and State, and why is it surfacing in politics today?
3. More information about the popular culture in which religion is now surfacing - like the Cabelas store, or Boyd’s Bears
4. Conflicting theories of the Founding Father’s religious orientation are confusing
5. What is ‘American’ about American religion and what does America ‘do’ to religious traditions?
6. Secular, patriotic ‘use’ of religious symbols and themes ‘manifest destiny’ and chosenness – patriotism as religion. ‘Civil Religion’
7. American religion in the Global arena
8. Spread of religion, regional difference, like the Pacific Northwest where the ‘unchurched’ is a large and proud category, or local places like Appalachia where media and other outside forces challenge the region to change
9. Contrast to the ‘spread’ of religion, interest in understanding the ‘contraction’/decline of religion, specifically of ‘mainstream’ Protestantism
10. ‘cultism’ –why more invented in America
11. Non- Judeo/Christian religious growth