Daniel Silliman is an instructor of American religion and culture for the Heidelberg Center for American Studies at Heidelberg University. He is an associate editor of “Religion and the Marketplace in the United States,” and you can follow him on Twitter @danielsilliman.
"...scholars should be more conscious of the ways in which some experiences are being distinguished (often implicitly), by either the person having the experience, the community in which the experience is happening, or the scholar studying it. Attention should be paid to the ways in which an experience is being marked as the sort of experience that is interesting."
The starting assumption is that religious people will be fundamentally unable to speak to those who don’t share their faith. But why start with the assumption that translation will be a problem? Living in a country where you don’t know the language means you have a great excuse for not talking to Jehovah’s Witnesses. To be completely honest, I actually did understand the two Witnesses when they came to my door.
Rushdoony, as he emerges in McVicar’s narrative, does not seem inspired by his own vision of biblical families. Rebecca Rushdoony once condemned a cat as a heretic. The eldest child of R.J. Rushdoony, an American theologian dedicated to helping Christians learn to build God’s kingdom on earth, Rebecca was mad the stray cat wouldn’t stay put. So she pronounced the cat damned, much to her father’s amusement.
Maffly-Kipp offers what might be thought of as a mandate for borders for religious historians towards the end of the conversation. She and Gorman are talking about global histories, and specifically how global history re-shapes American religious history. Maffly-Kipp says it’s not enough to note borders and the crossing of borders, in religious histories. Instead, the meaning and affects and effects of borders on religion must be carefully examined.
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