At Reset – Dialogues on Civilization, Elisabetta Ambrosi and sociologist Roger Friedland discuss how Obama is working to transform religion into “an instrument for social justice”:
The difference between Bush and Obama points to a longstanding division on just how religion has been constituted in America. On the one hand, the tradition that Bush follows is that sin is located in the individual soul, in our weakness, following St. Paul, in our personal rebellion against God. It is this tradition that has dominated the discourse of evangelical and fundamentalist communities. It is this tradition that is most consonant with a celebration of the market with its ethic of individual effort and individual reward. On the other hand, there is the “social gospel” tradition which says that the primary sources of sin are located in the society, in the way it robs individuals of dignity, of the possibility of making righteous choices. Obama comes from this latter tradition. For Obama, being a Christian means fighting for social justice. It is the same tradition that fired the black Baptists who defied the white racists of the South and destroyed segregation. It is, indeed, the same tradition that sent Union soldiers into battle against the southern slave states and ended slavery.
Read the full interview.