THE OXFORD HANDBOOK OF RELIGION AND AMERICAN EDUCATION

A collection of essays on religion and education in the United States.

Religion and education have been linked since the founding of America, one informing the other in a near-endless loop. Education has often been the place where religious and secular forces have met and, occasionally, locked horns. Even so, no single narrative characterizes religious education in America, just as no single religion characterizes Americans. “Whether informed or not, sophisticated or otherwise, adult Americans find good reason to use the schools, public and religious alike, as arenas where valuable experiments will and should occur,” writes the religious scholar Martin E. Marty in the foreword. “This is true in no small measure because of the presence of pluralism with its many faces.” Edited by Waggoner (Postsecondary Education/Univ. of Northern Iowa; editor: Religion in the Public Schools, 2013) and Walker (Religion and Law/Rutgers Univ., Camden; The First Amendment and State Bans on Teachers’ Religious Garb, 2019, etc.), this book explores the various facets of religion and education in America, both historically and in the present day, from issues of secularism, pluralism, and religious liberty in the past to questions of home schooling, religious charter schools, and the status of religion in public school curriculums. Additionally, the book goes beyond primary and secondary education to look at higher ed topics like Catholic and Evangelical universities, the field of religious studies, and the role of campus ministries. In addition to Marty, who won a National Book Award for Righteous Empire (1970), contributors include 40-odd scholars and educators from a variety of institutions both secular and religious. The work is firmly an academic one, and the prose speaks to a scholarly audience. “When the Constitution was enacted,” writes contributor Walter Feinberg, “the question of state support for education was moot since most people were unschooled, laws requiring compulsory public education did not yet exist, and most of the schools that did exist were sponsored by religious denominations.” While the book will surely interest those who study education in America, it is difficult to imagine a general audience feeling particularly compelled by the sometimes-dry arguments contained in these essays. That said, the curious will be rewarded with a better understanding of the complex forces that have shaped the current status of religion in American schools.

A comprehensive and probing guide to the meeting of schools and faith in the American experience.