The Limits of Interfaith/Interreligious Dialogue
August 16, 2012 2 Comments
Yesterday, Deepak Sarma, in a short and biting essay, basically dismissed interfaith/interreligious dialogue as a waste of most people’s time. Naturally, there were folks who have invested much time, energy, faith, and blood, sweat, and tears into the work of such dialogue who found his argument wanting. Though I think he overstates his case, I generally agree with Dr. Sarma.
In reading his article I was reminded of my time in Bulgaria last summer with the International Summer School on Religion and Public Life. Afterwards I was invited by the school to write an article for them. That article eventually became “Rejecting Utopias, Embracing Modesty.” One of the points of the article is that perhaps interfaith/interreligious practice is a better tool for overcoming religious intolerance, hatred, conflict, and violence than interfaith/interreligious dialogue is.
Now, generally speaking I am a “fan” of interfaith/interreligious dialogue. I think that it can and has been an activity that promotes and creates understanding, friendship, tolerance, and even a positive peace. However, as the years and years of such dialogue in Israel-Palestine or India so clearly show, it is by no means a cure-all for interreligious strife. And it has its own set of issues.
For example, choosing either “interfaith” or “interreligious” as the adjective is a loaded decision. One (interfaith) presumes the issue at stake is what one believes or has faith in. While sometimes this might actually be the case, in most cases the causes of conflict are economic, political, social, personal, or some mix of these factors. To choose “interreligious” assumes one can identify what counts as religion and that commitments to such things are the problem. Again, this may be the case but often is not. Thus, from the start, interfaith or interreligious dialogue proves to be a potentially helpful tool only for certain people and in certain situations.
In addition, one must ask, Why “dialogue”? This seems to be an especially western, if not Protestant Christian, way of addressing issues of religious conflict. And, of course, such sessions are often hosted by liberal Christians or those living in such an environment. Again, dialogue can be good, but it can too easily become theoretical, abstract, or about something other than actual conflicts. “Dialogue,” then, is only a limited tool for addressing religious conflict.
Thirdly, interfaith/interreligious dialogue is often critiqued for drawing those who are already like-minded and liberal leaning. Those who are often at the root of a conflict that exists for explicitly religious reasons are often those least likely to participate in such a session. Again, interfaith/interreligious dialogue is only one, and a limited one at that, tool in addressing religious conflict.
Finally, the biggest limit of interfaith/interreligious dialogue is when it actually achieves its goal of teaching those participating about another religion, but that truth turns out to be offensive. For example, while I can understand the wearing of headscarves by Muslim (or other) women as an act of devotion, piety, and modesty, I cannot understand the burqa as anything other than an act of oppression of women. I find it to be more than offensive; I find it to be unjust. In a like manner, I have “dialogued” with several Muslim women who insist that the immodesty of American women is truly offensive to them and they pray daily that their daughters will not be corrupted by this ungodly aspect of American culture. There is no bridging this gap, or “understanding” one another. I want burqas to cease to exist. They want women to cover up in public. We disagree and have reached an impasse that cannot be overcome. (This is just one example of many religious differences that can be uncomfortable, obnoxious, offensive, or distasteful.)
So, what do we do? Have some more dialogue? No. We must live together. Peacefully. And this is the rub. Dialogue can’t bring us to this point.
What can?
Well, I think that certain liberal legal provisions – like freedom of religion and speech – can help. But I also think that, perhaps, interfaith/interreligious practice might hold more promise than dialogue does.
For example, the American Civil Rights Movement (and the South African anti-apartheid movement) was, for its time, a remarkably interfaith affair. The shared practice of marching, prayer, and promoting justice enabled people of different faiths to live together. (Admittedly, the CRM was primarily a Christian movement, but the primarily Hindu movement for independence in India is another example.) I truly believe that shared work for justice is a better tool for bringing interreligious peace than dialogue is.
Or, shared rituals – like national holidays, though I worry about the ways that can fuel international conflicts, or local community gatherings – can build tolerant communities. Maybe caring for a community garden could bring together Christians who care about food justice, Jews and Muslims who have certain food requirements, and secularists who care about sustainability to invest in a common good and goal.
The point is this: Dialogue will not overcome all difference – and there are real differences, not all religions preach the same thing using different words – and some of those differences might very well be offensive, but we must still live together peacefully in those differences (especially when they are offensive). To do this, it seems to me, we must go far beyond talking to practicing life together. I’m really not sure what such practices might be in this or that particular community, but I am hopeful that such practices can take us farther than dialogue has or can.
I think you’re off-base here. #1, we already have interfaith practice, as in so far as you ride in a taxi, make a phone support call, get your oil changed in your car, work in an office building where somebody cleans at night, go to an emergency room when your child breaks a bone, etc., you are practicing your life with people of different religions. #2, intentional interfaith projects, such as cooperating in a Habitat for Humanity project, require interfaith dialogue meetings so that people can get together and meet and know each other. When people attended a memorial service at a Sikh Temple near Augusta, GA last week, that example of interfaith practice could only have occurred because people had done interfaith dialogue which created the networks to get the word out.
The specific example you cited is also trivial bordering on bizarre. You’re OK with Muslim and other women covering most of their bodies (it’s modesty), but when a women adds another 20cm x 10cm of cloth to cover her face, it’s oppression.
Interfaith dialogue might help its participants to see that women’s practice of religion is more than how much or how little cloth she chooses to wear.
Note also the distinction between Muslim and “American” women, as if there are not Muslim American women.
Interfaith dialogue is of course no panacea, and we’re preaching to the choir, etc, but I think it’s kind of like calisthenics. They aren’t going to make you into Usain Bolt, but without them you’re a lot worse off.
BTW, I am a subscriber to this blog, and I’ve benefited from it.
Hi Ayman,
Thanks for the response. First, your pointing out my problematic distinction between “Muslim women” and “American women” is helpful and welcomed. You are right; I shouldn’t have done that. Primarily, I have conversations I’ve had with non-American, or older immigrant American, Muslim women in mind in those comments. I know many “born and raised” American Muslim women who wear no head covering or who wear a scarf. However, I do not know (though wouldn’t be surprised if I learned of) any “born and raised” American Muslim women who wear a burqa. And I should point out that I think this aspect of American culture (i.e. historically liberal views of appropriate women’s clothing) is as much a product of Protestant Christianity as it is of “secular liberalism” or anything else. So, I do see this issue, at least to some extent, as one of religious difference. (And, I wouldn’t exclude a form of “secularism” or atheism as necessarily “nonreligious” in the context we are talking about.) And even if this issue seems silly to you, I’m sure it’s not to others. But please don’t let the example cause you to miss the point, which is that sometimes religious beliefs and/or practices are offensive to those who don’t share that faith. Where does dialogue leave us when it brings to light or confirms such offensive beliefs/practices?
Second, though, is it seems to me we are talking about very different forms of practice. While you list only economic exchanges demanded by a capitalist economic system, my examples have much more to do with the shared promotion of the common good. For example, I really do think shared work for social justice has much more potential for building peace than riding in a cab or calling a help center. It seems we’re talking about apples and oranges when we talk about shared practices.
Finally, I’m not sure we mean the same thing when we talk about interfaith dialogue. I mean something much more than people of different faiths talking to one another. I mean organized meetings where people explain unique aspects of their faith to people of another faith. I don’t see how it’s necessary for interfaith dialogue to occur to organize a vigil, for example. Yes, certain networks are necessary for the word to get out, and these are often networks that are built through interfaith dialogue networks, but I don’t see how this must necessarily be the case. Couldn’t a community garden, like the one I mentioned in the post, also get the network out without every having held interfaith dialogue meetings? But, that seems to me to be a side issue.
What I, and Dr. Sarma in his original post that inspired this one, are getting at is the limits of interfaith dialogue in situations like the WI shooting. There were people advocating more interfaith dialogue after the shooting as if people like the shooter will not commit future acts of terrorism if we can get them dialoguing soon enough. That, it seems to me, overestimates the power and purpose of such (admittedly very helpful) sessions. However, I do wonder if the shooter had co-coached his child in a soccer league with a member of that temple – whether they ever talked about religion at all – that the act might have been prevented, for example. So, I still wonder if interfaith practice might be more helpful than interfaith dialogue (though I don’t deny dialogue can be an important tool).