Religious Literacy

What Every American Needs to Know--And Doesn't

By: Stephen Prothero

Narrated by: Stephen Prothero

What's Your Religious Literacy IQ? Quick—can you:

• Name the four Gospels?
• Name a sacred text of Hinduism?
• Name the holy book of Islam?
• Name the first five books of the Hebrew Bible or the Christian Old Testament?Name the Ten Commandments?
• Name the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism?

If you can't, you're not alone. We are a religiously illiterate nation, yet despite this lack of knowledge, politicians continue to root public policy arguments in religious rhetoric whose meanings are missed—or misinterpreted—by the vast majority of Americans.

""We have a major civics education problem today,"" says religion scholar Stephen Prothero. He makes the provocative case that to remedy this, we should return to teaching religion in the public schools.

Alongside ""reading, writing, and arithmetic,"" religion ought to become the fourth ""R"" of American education. Many believe that America's descent into religious illiteracy was the doing of activist judges and secularists hell-bent on banishing religion from the public square. Prothero reveals that this is a profound misunderstanding. ""In one of the great ironies of American religious history,"" Prothero writes, ""it was the nation's most fervent people of faith who steered us down the road to religious illiteracy. Just how that happened is one of the stories this audio has to tell."" Religious Literacy reveals what every American needs to know in order to confront the domestic and foreign challenges facing this country today.

Good

I like learning many views on this subject.

Enjoyed the the audio book

I really enjoyed the audio book and realized how ignorant I am on my own Christian faith and the other faiths in the world

Worth your(our) while

As a number of reviewers have noted, this book is heavily biased toward Christianity. The author's intention is clearly laid out, however. It's a book about us (American citizens) and how we've lost any real understanding of the degree to which Christianity has become part of our culture, our politics, our mythology, etc. It isn't a Christian tract.

The US-centric focus of the book is set squarely in the context of a larger plea for religious literacy in the broadest sense, and the author provides (in the dictionary-like section others have mentioned) a wonderful springboard to the search each of us should make to understand how religion has infused most cultures.

Don't be put off by reviewers carping about not being spoon-fed a religious literacy education. This book grounds you in what's necessary to understand political dialog in the US and can, if well used, start you/us/me on a path to a more respectable cross-religion literacy.

What's your God-Q?

Despite being one of the most religious countries in the world, Americans know pitifully nothing about their religions. Not only do they not understand the tennents that they base their faith on, Americans don't know enough about other religions to understand world politics, enough about Christianity to understand political statements, our own history, or literary allusions (the entire time, I kept thinking about my college roommate who had to ask me (a Pagan) who Job is). He emphisizes, rightly, that the Supreme Court has, time and time again, reminded teachers that, while they cannot promote or preach religion, they are allowed to teach it.

While I agree completely with Prothero's dismaying statements about the woeful lack of understanding of the various religions out there, I don't view his solution as practical. Having a full year of religion education (one semester of the Bible, one semester of world religions) would be great, except for the fact that he glosses over the lack of time, funding, or ability to teach it properly. If religion is taught in classrooms, I am not afraid that all teachers will suddenly start prosletysing to students. I am afraid that all the interest and intrigue will be yanked out of religious study the same way it has been squeezed from the study of history in high schools (see Lies My Teacher Told Me)-or literature, or math, or evolution, or any other topic that is so facinating and important that gets the guts ripped out or gets taught to the lowest intellegence level in the classroom.

Unfairly criticised

The people who are blasting this book for not being a primer on religion are being unfair for two reasons: 1) That is not what the book is - the author says so right up front and the publisher's notes say so as well. It is not their fault if some did not read their comments or chose to ignore them. 2) The last part of the book is a primer, although I would not purchase it for this purpose.

The book is divided into three parts. In the first he makes the case that Americans, while being devout, are also ignorant. It seems that they chose to enthusiastically follow the Bible without actually bothering to read it. He then goes into why it is not only bad religion but also bad civics. His argument is clear and convincing although somewhat repetitive.

The second section is a brief history of religion, mostly in the US, and how the clashes of the competing interests lead a formerly Bible reading people into religious ignorance. His argument is again convincing but this time not quite as clear. His conclusion that much of the ignorance has been caused by the religious leadership(s) is surprising but well supported. Again, he would have benefitted from more editorial over-sight.

The last section is a glossary of religious terms which was a useful review of some basic concepts even for someone who, at least according to his pre and post test, is already fairly religiously literate (but not at all devout - which would support his thesis).

It is an interesting read for people who want to learn ABOUT religion in the U.S. and how it has evolved (or devolved) overtime that should have been better editted. People who are looking for a spiritual guide or a Bible review should look elsewhere.