Religious Identities and Communities of Meaning in the Realist Classroom

Abstract

Most of us on the academic left remain agnostic or atheist, despite the existence of a progressive Christian tradition, the oft-noted importance of the black churches in the civil rights movement, and the appealing ideals of liberation theology. There may be a variety of reasons for this: the continued influence of the Enlightenment tradition, the general trend to secularism encouraged by the advance of Capital, the conservative role that the church often plays in places like the United States. Certainly, many out queers (such as myself) have had their fill of conservative and evangelical forms of Christianity and their peculiar homohatred.