James Davison Hunter
The Culture War and the
Sacred/Secular Divide:
The Problem of Pluralism
and Weak Hegemony
ON THE FACE OF IT, THE CULTURE WAR THAT HAS UNFOLDED OVER
the last several decades has been a proxy for the conflict between
the sacred and the secular. At its rhetorical extreme, one could hear
accusations and counteraccusations among activists about the opposing
threats of equally exclusive theocratic and secular social orders.
Though this kind of hj^erbole always strained credulity, there were
also some good reasons to take seriously the more tempered view that
the culture war really was at least partially predicated upon a division
between religious and secular sensibilities.
One witnessed it play out within the symbolism on a range of
issues, from abortion (where the fetus is either made in God's image
or is merely potentially human) to sexuality (where homosexuality is
characterized either as natural and beautiñil or a perversion of sacred
order); from avant-garde art (that is regarded as either innovative or
sacrilegious) to church-state issues (where faith has either a privileged
status or no status in the shaping of law and public policy); from gender
(where roles and authority within the family either model a sacred
order or are human constructions for which we are free to negotiate) to
education (where schools cultivate values that either reflect the JudeoChristian
tradition or that are pragmatic and subjectivist).
social research Vol 76 : No 4 : Winter 2009 1307
One also saw it in the demography of popular support for different
positions on contested issues. For example, the strongest supporters
of restrictions on abortion and gay rights have long been disproportionately
from the ranks of the most religiously observant and the strongest
supporters of abortion rights are disproportionately less observant and
even secular in their self-described preferences.
One could see it play out further in the historical narrative that
has animated competing visions of American history and purpose. The
discourse surrounding America's origin and meaning has been at odds,
where one hears, on the one hand, a story about America whose destiny
is framed by providence or else a story of America as a noble but thoroughly
secular experiment.
Even well-known commentators reinforced this perception. As
Simon Schama said of the election of 2004, "not since the Civil War has
the fault lines between its two halves been so glaringly clear. . . . It is
time we called those two Americas something other than Republican
and Democrat, for their mutual alienation and unforgiving contempt is
closer to Sunni and Shia, or (in Indian terms) Muslim and Hindu. How
about, then. Godly America and Worldly America."^
Again, on the face of it, the confiict within American public
culture over the last decades appeared to be a proxy for a confiict
between two hegemonic tendencies—one based in religion and the
other based in secularity. As such, each in its own way, engaged in a
denial of pluralism.
The reality, of course, has been and remains more complicated
than this. The simple duality between the sacred and the secular was
always clearest ftom a distance and in the abstract. One problem is
that in lived experience, neither the sacred nor the secular exists as
generic realities. They are, by nature, particular and thus plural. What
is more, except among the most extreme, neither side ever rejected
pluralism either as a principle or as a reality. Activists and organizations
on both sides of the cultural divide embraced the symbolic identity
of America as e pluribus unum. The central questions were and are.
What is the nature of the unuml And what are the limits of the pluribus7
Though far ftom welcoming, the defenders of traditional order never
1308 social research
denied a place for secularists and the advocates of progressive change
never denied a place for people of faith, even people of orthodox faith.
Whatever else it may have been, cultural conflict in America has been
a conflict over the range and limits of acceptable pluralism; over where
and how and on what terms the boundaries of tolerable diversity would
be dravwi.
PLURALISM IS, NEEDLESS TO SAY, A DEFINING AND PERMANENT
feature of the modem world order. We late moderns are constituted
by our differences and its resulting—even if perhaps unintended—
syncretisms.
In this context, there has been a strong tendency to view pluralism
and, especially, the pluralism of behef, as an endless and random
patchwork quilt of beliefs. The leading accounts in sociology have
certainly depicted pluralism this way. Wade Glark Roof, for example,
has described it as "a brilliantly colored kaleidoscope ever taking on
new conflgurations of blended hues" (Roof 2001: 4). Faith in America,
he argued, is a broad and eclectic marketplace of faiths and spiritualities
that includes everyone from religious dogmatists and born-again
Ghristians to mainstream believers, from metaphysical seekers to secularists,
all of whom are distinctive in their lifestyles, family patterns,
and moral values.
This sense of modern pluralism as a near-infinite yet random
number of spiritual and religious positions is reinforced in phenomenological
descriptions in which we all experience "an ever-v^âdening variety
of moral/spiritual options, across the thinkable and perhaps even
beyond." Modern conditions of belief have created, in Gharles Taylor's
terms, a spiritual supernova that creates in between exclusive theism
and an exclusive self-sufficient materialism "a space in which people
can wander between and around all these options without having to
land clearly and definitively in any one" (Taylor 2007: 351). The expressivism
of the Romantic period has only validated this "wandering" in
subjective consciousness as a quest for authenticity.
Not least, this idea of pluralism as a rich and mostly arbitrary
tapestry of belief has long been validated as a normative ideal. This
The Culture War and the Sacred/Secular Divide 1309
finds expression in one of the leading traditions of pohtical theory, in
which the state remains "independent of controversial philosophical
and religious doctrines" (Rawls 1985) precisely because ofthe impossibility
of finding consensus among the range of religious and moral
options. This is validated in legal theory in the free exercise clause
of the First Amendment. It also finds expression in education, where
multicultural curricula celebrates the range of diverse cultures, each
Math its oviTi relatively distinctive way of life and identity; none better
or worse that any other. Paeans to a wide, indiscriminate diversity can
be found in popular culture as well.^
There is validity and virtue to this picture of plurahsm and yet, on
its own, it is misleading as a description ofthe full range of pluralism's
nature and dynamics. In particular, these accounts leave out a range
of institutional factors—structures of power—that make pluralism in
public life anything but indiscriminate or random.
CONSIDER THE MATTER HISTORICALLY. V^HERE PLURALISM HAS
existed throughout most of human history, it has tended to operate
within the framework of a strong dominant culture. This has always
and everywhere been the experience of the Jevdsh community, but it
has been true for others as well: Christians in pagan antiquity, Muslims
in the Venetian repubhc ofthe eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries,
Latin Christians in Byzantium through the High Middle Ages, and
Baha'is in Persia. If one were a part of a minority religious or philosophical
community, one understood the governing assumptions,
conventions, and practices of social life and learned how to operate
vdthin them the best one could. Because ofthe relatively insular nature
of social life, whether in the majority or the minority, one could be
convinced ofthe superiority of one's own beliefs and ways of life and
not necessarily have to ever seriously face up to the claims of another.
Even through the modern period, religious and philosophical diversity
existed within a dominant public culture. In nineteenth-century
America, for example. Catholics and Jews had to learn how to survive
in a public culture that was overpoweringly Protestant and through
most ofthe twentieth century, Jews, secularists, Buddhists, Hindus, and
1310 social research
Muslims have had to learn how to survive in a public culture that was
predominantly Christian.
This, it seems to me, is no longer the case. Religious and philosophical
pluralism—at least in late modern America—exists without a
dominant culture, at least not one of overwhelming credibility or one
that is beyond challenge. This does not mean that in some important
quarters of social life, a particular cultural orientation will not have
an advantage over others. In elite realms of cultural production, for
example, the world of academia, the news media, high art and fashion,
a certain kind of narrow secularity prevails. In other quarters, such as
the military, an orthodox Christian theism seems ubiquitous and has,
accordingly, enormous sway. There are, of course, important regional
differences as well—say, in the Bible Belt, the Bay Area, the Northeast,
for example. The playing field in which contemporary pluralism exists,
then, is far from even.
There is another factor to consider. In our time, what does exist
of a dominant culture is attenuated. Indeed, if there is a center in
American culture and politics today, it is certainly not "the vital center"
that Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. described and hoped for at mid-century
(Schlesinger 1949). In fact, it is probably fair to say that Schlesinger's
"vital center" and the WASP consensus that underwrote it may have
begun to erode the moment he declared its triumph. What "center"
exists today seems to be mostly passive and of the thinnest content.
This "center" is certainly not dense in its normative foundations, clear
and purposeful in its vision for the future, or coherent in its political
ideals. This is not to say that there aren't civic-minded people or organizations
that aspire to such vitality on behalf of the common good. There
are many. Rather, it is only to say that it such vitality is not shared in
ways that transcend political party or partisan interest or in ways that
provide thick and unifying normative affirmations. One can identify
hypemorms, agreements in public opinion, but those agreements tend
to be minimal at best. To imagine any unanimity beyond these minimal
agreements, one that would give expression to extensive and multilayered
understandings of the world and our purpose in it, is doubtful.
For the foreseeable future, the likelihood that any one culture could
The Culture War and the Sacred/Secular Divide 1311
become dominant in the ways that Protestantism and Christianity did
in the past is not great.
What this means is that a fragile and unstable pluralism has
become a fundamental feature of the contemporary social order, both
here in America and, perhaps, the world.
But this does not mean that such instability is permanent or
that there aren't other factors in play that could effect the interrelation
within this pluralistic mix. In short, there are strong motivational
factors that bear on the mobilization of resources as well as institutional
pressures, most notably in the requirement of law and public
policy that press us to a greater articulacy in public culture; an articulacy
that forces agreements where, in an intensely pluralistic society,
agreements are neither natural nor consensual.
There are, for one, pressures created by the practical need for a
universal system of law and justice. Law, we know, is not just a formal
system of rules telling us what we can and cannot do, must and must
not do. Laws, if only implicitly, also contain a moral story that proclaim
the ideals and principles of the people who live by them, and as such
give particular legal prescriptions their meaning and purpose.^ They
speak of a society's understanding of the common good. Universal
public education exerts other pressures toward finding and maintaining
some thicker agreements in public culture. It is not so much the
particular skills children acquire in school as it is what they learn about
the national heritage and culture; and the duties of civic life necessary
to sustain that heritage. Questions concerning the common culture are
implicit here too. And then there is the need for policies to guide a
nation's interaction with other nations. In matters of trade, immigration,
and, most prominently, war, standards ofjustice and prudence are
inescapably at play.
Not least are the motivational factors that effect the mobilization
of resources in populist social movements. Minimally, individuals, associations,
and communities are motivated to survive. This means, at the
least, protecting their rights to believe, associate, and practice their religious
or moral commitments without interference or prejudice. This is
not a given in a context where the very existence of a group or set of
1312 social research
beliefs or practices may seem to threaten the existence or flourishing
of another. It is important not to underestimate the passions involved
here. People in these moral communities feel genuinely threatened.
They perceive that what makes them authentic as human beings—
whether their deepest convictions, their closest relationships, or their
most cherished ideals or capacities—are endangered. It is not only their
ov/n interests that they see as endangered but their deepest convictions
about what is in the interests of society as a whole. It is no wonder that
political passions are enflamed. The good that is in the world depends
upon their engagement and the influence they can wield.
All of these factors combine in ways that require greater specification
in law, social policy, ethics, and the like, ofthe terms by which
common life is ordered and regulated. For all of these reasons, neither
the state nor any other institution can be strictly neutral in matters
pertaining to the public good. All institutions make binding decisions
affecting the whole of society, in the name of sociefy itself To formulate
law and policy, then, is, as Robert Cover put it, to create and sustain a
particular nomos, a normative universe that draws distinctions, discriminates,
judges, excludes as well as includes. It is, in short, to weigh in
and even take sides on the matter ofthe public good.
In the case of the state, its decisions are reinforced by its claims
to the sole legitimate use ofviolence (Weber 1946:78) Those who fundamentally
disagree with the principles contained in law, refuse to submit
to them, and work outside of established channels for changing them
are, therefore, vulnerable to the exigencies of state-imposed violence.
It matters a great deal, then, how the government formulates law and
public policy in response to the various cultural controversies.
This creates a double-bind. On the one hand, a strong consensual
culture (at least in any explicit sense) is difficult to establish precisely
because belief is so fragmented.'' On the other hand, a social order
marked by a fragile and unstable pluralism is difficult to sustain over
time because there are built-in institutional pressures to resolve differences
among rival factional interests and opposing moral ideals.^
In some respects, the culture war can be seen as an attempt to
resolve this double-bind through the effort of competing sides of the
The Culture War and the Sacred/Secular Divide 1313
cultural divide to establish a "weak hegemony." By weak hegemony I
do not mean anything as robust as a dominant ideology in the Marxist
formulation of the phrase. Rather, I refer to a minimal and flexible
framework of epistemic propensities,^ normative assumptions, dispositions,
myths, and symbols that loosely order public life; that allows
room for a certain range of acceptable diversity.
It is this effort to establish a weak hegemony that explains why so
many cultural issues have been contested politicoîîy—through litigation,
lobbying, and electoral politics. When factions employ these tools, they
use the instrumentalities of the state in order to secure the patronage of
the state, its resources and,finally,its coercive power. Needless to say, all of
these instrumentalities run roughshod over the actual far-ranging plurality
ofreligious and cultural commitment, typically reducing them to crude
simplifications, often based upon the narrow interests of activists.
The effort to establish a weak hegemony also helps to explain
the lopsided influence of cultural elites, the wide-ranging institutions
they lead, and their use of the instrumentalities of public discourse.
By virtue of having a disproportionate access to the means of public
communication, they provide the concepts, supply the grammar, and
explicate the logic of public discussion. In so doing, they have been and
are in a position to define and redefine the meaning of public symbols
as well as provide the legitimating or delegitimating narratives of public
life. In all of these ways, they, along with the institutions they serve,
come to frame the terms of public discussion.'^ In their net effect, the
special interests and the constraints built into the technologies of mass
communication mean that public discourse is truncated, eliminating
much of the complexity of public discourse.
The actual diversity of attitude, opinion, and belief in the general
population, then, was never reflected in the kind of artificially polarized
rhetoric of the special purpose groups, nor was it reflected in the
platforms or agendas of political parties, para-church groups, denominations,
and the like. Public discourse always tended to be more polarized
than its citizens' beliefs and moral commitments.
But that is just the point. The discursive and the political often
overlap but, in their net effect, they always reinforced each other.
1314 social research
Complexity, subtlety, refiectiveness, nuance—all of the things that
make for serious and substantive democratic engagement get forced
into a grid of rhetorical extremes. In the end, plurality is reduced to
duality; polyphony is very quickly reduced to a crude, hackneyed and
discordant diaphony.
In sum, while the picture of a random and indiscriminate plurality
provides a useful description of much experience in the private
sphere and in individual life, it is less useful when considering what
takes place in the public sphere. To rework Taylor's terms, how pluralism
is "spun" within the imminent frame, particularly through the
structure of powerful institutions and symbols in the public sphere, has
significant consequences for both public and private life.
TO REFLECT ON WHAT THIS MEANS FOR PLURALISM, LET'S STEP BACK
for a moment.
In a context of ftagile and unstable pluralism, boundary work is
a sociological necessity. Collective identities become crystallized most
sharply in relation to others who are different. The various means of
social control (for example, through punishment, litigation, ostracism,
opprobrium, name-calling, and the like) highlight these differences
and are, in fact, ways in which social groups assert their own
collective identity, establish and reestablish their moral authority, reinforce
the group's solidarity, and maintain boundaries between insiders
and outsiders. This dynamic is a fundamental feature of social life at
all levels of complexity or simplicity. Without such boundary work, a
social group, a community, or a whole society faces what may be an
even greater danger—its own internal moral disintegration (Douglas
1966). It is especially important in a time of fragility and instability.
Clearly boundaries have been redrav^Ti and protected. But how?
The premise of my own work on the normative confiicts of the
last half-century was that a realignment was taking place in American
public culture that was plajdng out not just on the surface of social
life but at the deepest and most profound levels; not just at the level
of ideology but in its public symbols, its myths, its discourse, and the
institutional structures that generate and sustain public culture. This
The Culture War and the Sacred/Secular Divide 1315
realignment cut across age-old divisions between Protestants and
Catholics and Jews. It also cut through the Enlightenment, dividing
secularists operating out of early Enlightenment epistemologies from
those operating out of high and post-Enlightenment epistemologies.
The orthodox in these religio-cultural traditions now had much more
in common wdth each other than they did with progressives in their
ovwi faith or philosophical tradition and vice versa.
In other words, the conflict has changed all ofthe players involved.
So too it has changed the dynamics of pluralism. In particular, the tactical
nature of the ongoing cultural conflict and the issues themselves
forced pragmatic alliances among communities and confessions that
had been at daggers for centuries. Anti-Gathohcism and anti-Semitism
are both deep and virulent and their histories are a critical chapter of
American history. Evangelicals in alliance with Gatholics? Ghristians in
alliance with Jews? Theists of different stripes in alliance with secularists?
The boundaries of tolerable diversity have been redrawn through
this conflict. But at the same time this realignment also created new
lines of division and exclusion.
In effect, the main actors on opposing sides have come to operate
v^th an implicit two-tier model of pluralism or tolerable diversity. On
one tier, there are those with whom they share complementary epistemologies,
moral visions, and social interests. Among these, there is a
general disposition to let a thousand flowers bloom. On the other tier are
those who do not share the compatible epistemological and normative
assumptions. On this tier, each side regards the others' beliefs and ways
of Hfe with a mixture of derision and indifference. The general disposition
is to tolerate the other so long as they keep to themselves. But
indifference turns to opposition (and often open hostility) the moment
the other seeks to widen their boundaries of legitimacy and social influence.
It is the aspiration to influence in the public sphere—asserting
a power oriented toward maintaining or expanding the boundaries of
social space—that constitutes the nmdamental breach.
What I think all of this suggests is that there are certain structural
preconditions for tolerance. Tolerance, in short, may not be so much
a function of "enlightenment" (though I do not want to sell "enlight-
1316 social research
enment" short), as it is a function of the relative sharpness of moral
boundaries separating groups, where those boundaries are drawn, and
on what side you stand. With the restructuring of pluralism, the boundaries
separating groups has shifted. As the lines dividing Protestant,
Catholic, and Jew have become more indistinct, toleration and acceptance
have increased but as the lines dividing orthodox fi:om progressive
have become clearer and sharper, new bigotries have begun to take
shape. The contemporary conñict, then, is not so much between one
alliance that is tolerant (because it is cosmopolitan and highly educated)
and another that is intolerant (because it is religiously conservative and
less well educated). Neither is it between those who would guide people
toward truth and those who would indoctrinate. Each side asserts its
own parochialisms. Here again we see that the cultural conflict emerges
over how pluralism is constituted; over what range of beliefs and moral
practices are tolerable or intolerable.
But things continue to be in flux. Actors are changed by the
encounter.
There is something more going on here. Longer-standing boundaries
between the sacred and secular are being renegotiated as well.
Let's step back even further.
ONE V^^AY THAT THE HISTORY OF AMERICA CAN BE TOLD IS THROUGH THE
Story of expanding pluralism and, not least, religious pluralism. With
each wave ofexpansion in religious and cultural pluralism, not to mention
racial and ethnic pluralism, came a challenge to inherited understandings
ofAmerica's collective identity and civic culture. This expansion has been
anything but linear, gradual, and harmonious. With every surge of expansion,
the stability of public culture was challenged. Tension, conflict, and,
at times, violence ensued as rising groups have challenged an existing
social, religious, and political establishment that excluded them from
public life and from membership and participation in collective hfe. It
is arguable that some ofthe nation's greatest sufferings have occurred at
precisely these points of expansion and, in turn, the struggle for assimilation.
This is perhaps most obviously tme as it bears on race and ethnicity
but it is no less true as it bears on religious and moral community.
The Culture War and the Sacred/Secular Divide 1317
The story is told repeatedly. Thus, as the number of Catholics
increased, their marginality was reinforced through institutional, physical
and symbolic coercion. Itwas not only innumerable groups such as the
Know-Nothing Sociefy that were bent on purging the country of "foreign
influence. Popery, Jesuitism, and Catholicism," it was a sentiment deeply
embedded within the economic, educational, and status structures of
the entire sociefy. It was only after more than a century of hostilify and
the realization that Catholics were not going away that the position of
Catholics changed to one of grudging inclusion. The experience of the
Mormons partially overlaps that of Catholics and their reception too was
anything but warm and hospitable. Rejection, denunciation, exclusion,
and even murder forced their Westward migration. The same can be said
for the Jewish immigration: anti-Semitism was part and parcel of the
Jewish experience in America from the beginning. There are elements
of this beginning with the Muslim communify. In sum, tension, conflict,
and violence are inherent within pluralism and particularly at the points
of expansion. Hostilify, prejudice, exclusion, and violence are not so
much religious debates carried too far, but rather tensions inherent to
the contest over social space and collective identify.®
Eventually space has opened up and new boundaries are normalized
around them. They achieve some acceptance within the public
imagination and their inclusion is reinforced vwthin public institutions.^
In short, assimilation occurs—but over a long period of time (sometimes
multiple generations) and never without social tensions and conflict.
But normalization is never stasis. Configurations of authorify
are never without challenge, never without conflicting pressures. The
boundaries continue to shift. The last decades ofthe twentieth century
were a time of incredible flux in which the terms of older establishments
have destabilized and what will replace them remain contested
and thus undecided. The culture war can be read as a negotiation over
what will come next.
Alliances notwithstanding, the two most prominent actors in this
conflict have been cultural elites from Evangelicalism and secularism
(such as it is). I am going to paint with a broad brush—there is a lot of
nuance I will leave out—but bear with me.
1318 social research
Since the nineteenth century, small "e" evangelicalism—^which
became large "E" evangelicalism—has been on a long trajectory from the
center ofcultural formation to the periphery. It has continued to do weU as
a populist movement but its infiuence in the centers of intellectual, scientific,
and aesthetic production has been in demonstrable decline. In this
respect evangelicals have moved to the margins. In the process, it endured
a century-long schism from its liberal/progressive wing and a combination
ofwithdrawal and eviction from its leading role in mass education, higher
learning, and social services, among other realms of life.
Now consider secularism—though not as a movement or an ideology
but simply as a demographic. We know that secularists are diverse
within themselves, just as Catholics and Evangelicals are. Allowing for
this complexity, if one thinks of secularists as a broad demographic,
one can see that they are, in a manner of speaking, the fastest growing
religio-cultural group in America. In 1960, self-identified secularists
comprised less than 2 percent of the population; That grew to 5
percent in the early 1970s and 12 percent by the late 1990s. It is now
in the range of 15 to 17 percent. Most significantly, they are disproportionately
represented in upper middle classes and in the high-prestige
centers of cultural production.
I want to argue that the natural tensions of assimilation among
secularists are not appreciably different from any other religious
group wanting to be assimilated into the mainstream. The difference
is that this is happening at the same time that Evangelicalism is being
de-assimilated. The prestige and authority in the centers of social influence
of one have been rising over the last half-century, while the prestige
and authority of the other have been in weakening.
It is a contest over social space and voice. Cultural conservatives
generally, but Evangelicals in particular, chose a political strategy to
maintain their place of privilege in the shaping of the moral order. The
strategy was largely successful for a quarter century. But the moment
of its greatest triumph, the 2004 presidential election, seemed also the
moment that marked the beginning of what may be its final move to
the periphery of social influence. The 2004 election may have generated
more hostility toward Evangelicalism than any time before in its past. The
The Culture War and the Sacred/Secular Divide 1319
culmination of this descent seemed to be S3mibolized in the 2008 election,
when vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin performed on Saturday
Night Live. Imagine WilliamJennings Bryan coauthoring an editorial with
H. L. Mencken that made fun of himself (Bryan) at the Scopes trial. Ifyou
can picture this, then you can understand the symbohc significance of
Sarah Palin participating with Tina Fey in her ovm self-parody.
Over the same quarter century, secularists overall were not
nearly as successful in a strategy of electoral politics but they have been
able to secure a place vwthin the centers of cultural formation, such as
universities, publishing, advertising, and entertainment.
These long-term historical trends are not over. Secularists
have not triumphed once and for all, nor is the so-called Christian
Right dead. Conflict vdll continue. No one really has claim to a weak
hegemony.
But at the same time, it is important to note that cultural conservatives
and cultural progressives have been changed by the encounter.
Cultural conservatives, and evangelicals in particular, are accommodating
to many of the cognitive and normative assumptions of secular
modernity. Polls show that they are dramatically more tolerant of atheists
and homosexuality than they were 40 years ago and, in spite of
themselves, it is clear that they participate fully in a normative ethos
of therapeutic individualism. At the same time, and against their fondest
wishes, secularists are coming to terms with the fact that people of
faith, and people of orthodox faith not least, are not going away and
that many of the concerns about character and virtue may be legitimate
and might need to be addressed.
I WILL CONCLUDE BY SAYING THAT GREAT NORMATIVE CONFLICTS
of the last half-centuiy are part and parcel of longer term historical
changes that include demographic shifts (the growth of some actors
and the reduction of others) but more significantly, they involve a shifting
in the boundaries that define the space of public culture and who
occupies the places of privilege and influence—of assimilation and
de-assimilation. The confiict enfiames passions, challenges democratic
civility, and generates many unintended consequences but it is an inev-
1320 social research
itable part of the changes that are unfolding. But there is no inevitable
outcome. Among the many things at stake in this conflict is pluralism
itself; of where and how and on what terms the boundaries of tolerable
diversity will be drawn. This question too remains unresolved.
NOTES
1. In a 2004 column, humorist Dave Barry added more descriptive
color when he depicted it as a conflict between "ignorant, racist,
fascist knuckle-dragging NASGAR-obsessed cousin-marrying, roadkill
eating, tobacco-juice-dribbling, gun-fondling religious fanatic
rednecks ..." and "godless, unpatriotic, pierced-nose, Volvo-driving,
France-loving, left-wing communist, latte-sucking, toñi-chomping,
holisüc-wacko neurotic vegan weenie perverts."
2. Again, these are both secular (as in the popular song, "Imagine," by
John Lennon) and religious sentiments ("red and yellow, black and
white, they are precious in His sight," from the song, "Jesus Love the
Little Ghildren").
3. As Robert Gover ofYale University once put it, "For every constitution
there is an epic, for each decalogue a scripture" (Gover 1983:4).
4. This leaves aside, for the moment, the ways in which a dominant
culture could be constituted implicitly. More on this later in the
essay.
5. This double-bind creates the conditions for a semi-permanent legitimation
crisis in which the legitimacy of one side depends upon the
delegitimation of the other side. It is both in terms of the appeal
to legitimacy made by those in authority and the popular consent
given—^what is self-evidently credible and acceptable for one is utterly
counterfeit for the other. Eight years of Glinton hatred balanced by
eight years of Bush hatred is one poignant manifestation of this
tendency.
6. By which I mean orientations in the way knowledge and understanding
are grounded; these are manifested as habits of thinking and
practices of moral reasoning.
7. See Snow and Benford (1988, 1992). This is the first reason the vast
majority of Americans who are somewhere in the middle of these
The Culture War and the Sacred/Secular Divide 1321
debates are not heard. They have no access to the tools of public
culture in the way elites do.
8. Much of this argument in taken from Hunter and Franz (2006).
9. The Protestant andJudeo-Christian establishments were both coercive
cultural establishments of a kind; they were hard-won and continually
contested, but eventually normalized. In this regard it is important to
note that the terms of "establishment" will vary considerably, largely
due to conditions intrinsic to the religious community itself
REFERENCES
Cover, Robert. "Nomos and Narrative." Harvard Law Review 97;1 (Nov.
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Douglas, Mary. Purity and Danger. London; Routiedge, 1966.
Hunter, D., and David Franz. "Religious Pluralism and Civil Society." A
Nation ofReligions . Ed. Steven Prothero. Chapel Hill: University of
North Carolina Press, 2006.
Rawls, John. "Justice as Fairness: Political Not Metaphysical." Philosophy
and PublicAJfairs 14:3 (Summer 1985): 223-251.
Roof, Wade Clark. Spiritual Marketplace: Baby Boomers and the Remaking of
American Religion. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001.
Schlesinger, Jr., Arthur. The Vital Center. Boston; Houghton-Mifflin, 1949.
Snow, D., and R. Benford. "Ideology, Frame Resonance, and Participant
Mobilization." International Social Movement Research 1 (1988)
197-217.
. "Master Frames and Cycles of Protest." Frontiers in Sodal Movement
Theory. Eds. A. D. Morris and C. M. Mueller. New Haven: Yale
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Taylor, Charles. The Secular Age. Cambridge: Harvard University Press,
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Weber, Max. "Politics as a Vocation." Essays in Sodology. Eds. Hans Certh
and C. W. Mills. New York, Oxford, 1946.
1322 social research
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