Overview

Occupy Religion introduces readers to the growing role of religion in the Occupy Movement and asks provocative questions about how people of faith can work for social justice. From the temperance movement to the Civil Rights movement, churches have played key roles in important social movements, and Occupy Religion shows this role is no less critical today.

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9781442217928

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Reviews

Engaged theology at its best: passionate, articulate, and informed by deep knowledge of tradition and awareness of the pressing realities of contemporary political and personal life. A splendid resource for students, their teachers, and all who search for the sacred in a world of destructive economic and political domination. -- Roger S. Gottlieb, author of A Greener Faith: Religious Environmentalism and our Planet's Future and Joining Hands: Politics and Religion Together Occupy Religion is a brilliantly unfinished book of theology that constantly opens a door to a new hope for multitude. In line with the Social Gospel movement and the Civil Rights movement, this book involves the church in the Occupy Movement for the sake of 99 percent of the US population. With the aspiration of foretasting the just and compassionate Reign of God in the United States and the rest of the world, this new theological movement emerges from the 'deep solidarity' with the people of the Occupy Movement, a fundamental challenge to the present practice of neoliberal American capitalism. I highly recommend this book to all justice loving Christians. -- Andrew Sung Park, author of From Hurt to Healing, professor of theology at United Theological Seminary Inspired by the global mass protests of 2011, Occupy Religion proposes a Theology of the Multitude that challenges traditional ways of thinking about religion, transcendence, and the ecclesial community. The significance and the reach of these global mass protests of 2011 will be on-going. By suggesting there is a symbiotic relationship between the 1% and the 99%, Rieger and Kwok contest religious concepts that have been used to reinforce the top-down domination of the 1%. Occupy Religion is a must read for those of us concerned with the confluence of religion and the logic of to-down domination as well as for those resisting and working with a vision that another world is possible! -- Wonhee Anne Joh, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary This compelling, comprehensive look at the spiritual heart of the Occupy movement not only issues a challenge to those trapped in liberal, modern understandings of religion, but it also captures Occupy's rich possibilities for global transformation and new theologies. It places faith right where it belongs: in the public spheres that ought to serve justice for all, to protect human rights and freedom, and to promote a common good and sustainable life on earth. -- Rita Nakashima Brock, Brite Divinty School, coauthor of Saving Paradise, and member of Occupy Oakland In Occupy Religion two Christian theologians offer observations concerning the Occupy movement that swept through many American cities in 2011 and 2012. Rieger (Southern Methodist Univ.) and Pui-lan (Episcopal Divinity School) discuss the implications they find in that movement for religious thought generally and for Christian theology in particular. Adopting the Occupy movement's insistence that society is divided into the 1 percent and the 99 percent, they describe the latter as the multitude, a group whose protest is legitimate and long overdue. The core of their thesis is presented in chapters on the God of the multitude and the church of the multitude. Therein they argue for an immanent God and a church of inclusion that is not restricted by time and space. The Occupy movement's claims regarding itself tend to be taken rather uncritically. Not all readers will find convincing this book's use of the Occupy movement as a kind of metaphor for all contemporary movements of social and economic protest. Nonetheless, this volume does offer thought-provoking observations on what a convincing contemporary image of God might be and on how a viable church might be shaped for the 21st century. Summing Up: Recommended. Researchers/faculty, professionals/practitioners, and general readers. CHOICE

Engaged theology at its best: passionate, articulate, and informed by deep knowledge of tradition and awareness of the pressing realities of contemporary political and personal life. A splendid resource for students, their teachers, and all who search for the sacred in a world of destructive economic and political domination. -- Roger S. Gottlieb, author of A Greener Faith: Religious Environmentalism and our Planet's Future and Joining Hands: Politics and Religion Together Occupy Religion is a brilliantly unfinished book of theology that constantly opens a door to a new hope for multitude. In line with the Social Gospel movement and the Civil Rights movement, this book involves the church in the Occupy Movement for the sake of 99 percent of the US population. With the aspiration of foretasting the just and compassionate Reign of God in the United States and the rest of the world, this new theological movement emerges from the 'deep solidarity' with the people of the Occupy Movement, a fundamental challenge to the present practice of neoliberal American capitalism. I highly recommend this book to all justice loving Christians. -- Andrew Sung Park, author of From Hurt to Healing, professor of theology at United Theological Seminary Inspired by the global mass protests of 2011, Occupy Religion proposes a Theology of the Multitude that challenges traditional ways of thinking about religion, transcendence, and the ecclesial community. The significance and the reach of these global mass protests of 2011 will be on-going. By suggesting there is a symbiotic relationship between the 1% and the 99%, Rieger and Kwok contest religious concepts that have been used to reinforce the top-down domination of the 1%. Occupy Religion is a must read for those of us concerned with the confluence of religion and the logic of to-down domination as well as for those resisting and working with a vision that another world is possible! -- Wonhee Anne Joh, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary This compelling, comprehensive look at the spiritual heart of the Occupy movement not only issues a challenge to those trapped in liberal, modern understandings of religion, but it also captures Occupy's rich possibilities for global transformation and new theologies. It places faith right where it belongs: in the public spheres that ought to serve justice for all, to protect human rights and freedom, and to promote a common good and sustainable life on earth. -- Rita Nakashima Brock, Brite Divinty School, coauthor of Saving Paradise, and member of Occupy Oakland

Author Information

Joerg Rieger is Wendland-Cook Professor of Constructive Theology at Southern Methodist University. He is the author of numerous books, including Christ and Empire. He lives in Dallas, Texas. Kwok Pui-lan is William F. Cole Professor of Christian Theology and Spirituality at Episcopal Divinity School. She is the most recent past president of the American Academy of Religion and author of several books. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

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