Product Description

The United States is one of the most religious places on earth, but it is also a nation of shocking religious illiteracy.

• Only 10 percent of American teenagers can name all five major world religions and 15 percent cannot name any.
• Nearly two-thirds of Americans believe that the Bible holds the answers to all or most of life's basic questions, yet only half of American adults can name even one of the four gospels and most Americans cannot name the first book of the Bible.

Despite this lack of basic knowledge, politicians and pundits continue to root public policy arguments in religious rhetoric whose meanings are missed—or misinterpreted—by the vast majority of Americans.

"We have a major civic problem on our hands," says religion scholar Stephen Prothero. He makes the provocative case that to remedy this problem, we should return to teaching religion in the public schools. Alongside "reading, writing, and arithmetic," religion ought to become the "Fourth R" of American education.

Many believe that America's descent into religious illiteracy was the doing of activist judges and secularists hell-bent on banishing religion from the public square. Prothero reveals that this is a profound misunderstanding. "In one of the great ironies of American religious history," Prothero writes, "it was the nation's most fervent people of faith who steered us down the road to religious illiteracy. Just how that happened is one of the stories this book has to tell."

Prothero avoids the trap of religious relativism by addressing both the core tenets of the world's major religions and the real differences among them. Complete with a dictionary of the key beliefs, characters, and stories of Christianity, Islam, and other religions, Religious Literacy reveals what every American needs to know in order to confront the domestic and foreign challenges facing this country today.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #166475 in Books
• Published on: 2007-03-01
• Released on: 2007-03-13
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 304 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Prothero (American Jesus), chair of the religion department at Boston University, begins this valuable primer by noting that religious illiteracy is rampant in the United States, where most Americans, even Christians, cannot name even one of the four Gospels. Such ignorance is perilous because religion "is the most volatile constituent of culture" and, unfortunately, often "one of the greatest forces for evil" in the world, he writes. Prothero does more than diagnose the problem; he traces its surprising historic roots ("in one of the great ironies of…history, it was the nation's most fervent people of faith who steered Americans down the road to religious illiteracy") and prescribes concrete solutions that address religious education while preserving First Amendment boundaries about religion in the public square. Prothero also offers a dictionary of religious literacy and a quiz for readers to test their knowledge. This book is a must-read not only for educators, clergy and government officials, but for all adults in a culture where, as Prothero puts it, "faith without understanding is the standard" and "religious ignorance is bliss." (Mar.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
*Starred Review* The author of I^ American Jesus (2003) opens this important book with a paradox. To wit, Americans are deeply religious I^ and profoundly ignorant about religion; that is, one of the most religious countries is also a nation of "religious illiterates." Prothero calls religious illiteracy dangerous because religion is one of the greatest forces for good--as well as evil--in the world. Nowadays, standing on shaky religious ground can be literally a matter of life and death. To cite two brief examples of America's religious illiteracy: only half of American adults can name one of the four Gospels, and 10 percent of Americans believe that Joan of Arc was Noah's wife. Prothero defines religious literacy--what it is, and what it is not. He also discusses the two great religious revivals in U.S. history, the Second Great Awakening of the nineteenth century and the postwar revival of the 1940s and 1950s. He argues both the constitutionality and the necessity of teaching--with an emphasis on spreading knowledge, not inculcating values--about religion in public schools and higher education. He suggests that every U.S. public high school should require a course on the Bible and another on the religions of the world. And he devotes an entire chapter to "a modest list" of a hundred or so religious terms that he deems essential, from I^ Abraham to I^ Zionism, to any American's religious knowledge. A must-read on its subject. June Sawyers
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
"Compelling and persuasively presented . . . a critical addition to the debate about teaching religion in public school." -- San Francisco Chronicle

"Prothero makes you want to go back to college ... a scholar with the soul of a late-night television comic." -- Newsweek

"Religious Literacy presents a compelling argument for Bible-literacy courses." -- Time magazine

Customer Reviews

Not Religion 101
I saw this book discussed on "The Jon Stewart Show" and thought the premise was interesting. I share in the author's concern about the increasing religious illiteracy of our nation. It doesn't mean that you have to be religious to appreciate the value that religion has contributed historically and culturally. As the author states, you just can't be an educated citizen without knowledge of religion, especially in times like these when religion is infusing our politics be it from the Religious Right or from dangerous misconceptions that we have about Islam. In order to be a good "world citizen," you really do need to know about religion. That is the author's premise in a nutshell.

Now, having said this, the book is not exactly what I expected. It is divided into three parts, outlining what we used to know about religion starting from Colonial times, how we gradually inadvertently became increasingly illiterate about the subject, and the author's ideal proposal of how to get back our knowledge, which is a very ambitious proposal indeed. I enjoyed the first chapter or so where he discusses the extent to which Americans are illiterate about religion by citing startling statistical examples of misconceptions in the general public and humorous mistakes that students make in identifying Bible characters and stories. I also enjoyed the mini quiz that you can take to see just how illiterate you are.

However, with a title like the one this book has, I expected to be told outright just what it is we need to know about religion as is relevant to our times. I did not find this in the book except for the last chapter which is a dictionary of religious terms that the author believes are essential for us to know in our modern world. If only the entire book had been a discussion about this, I would have been more satisfied. It is more a history lesson about what we used to know and how we have lost that knowledge, but doesn't tell you really what you do need to know. So I found the title misleading.

The author does state clearly that the book is not a text on "Religion 101," but I wish it had been. Granted, I never read any reviews or even the description on the book beforehand - I just went on the title alone. But if only he had, for example, broken up the book into sections about topics that are relevant in the here and now, such as what Americans need to know about Islam (its holy book, major characters, teachings, and divisions). And another chapter on Christianity as far as divisions between Protestants and Catholics, about what different Protestant denominations believe, about morality and values, etc. All of these things are covered in the dictionary at the end of the book, but not so much in depth. This would have been different than just a "Religion 101" book because it would have dealt with religious topics and terms relevant to the here and now - indeed, it would have been an early 21st century primer on what we really need to know about religion to be educated world citizens in this day and age. That is what I had been expecting and I was disappointed that it was not.

An argument for improving religious literacy, NOT a way to improve your own
I didn't actually read this book--this review is about why I returned it to Amazon instead. After seeing an interview with the author, I bought the book expecting it to be a primer on the relationship between different religious forms, their practices, beliefs, etc. On receiving it, I discovered that the vast majority of the book is a (probably quite good) history of religious education in the US and a summary of its current state. Only one chapter of the book (admittedly the largest chapter) actually gives information actually about religion, and in an alphabetical, encyclopedic format rather than a narrative explanation.

If you're looking for a history of religious education and an argument for greatly expanding religious education today, please don't let this review stop you from buying. But if you're looking to educate yourself about (comparative) religion and beliefs other than your own, look elsewhere.

Why There Should be a Fourth "R"
Reading, Writing, Arithmetic and Religion. When I was in elementary school, I often asked, "Why do I have to do this?" and "Why can't I just work on stuff I'm going to need in real life?" Now that I'm living real life as an adult, I see how essential things like Bible stories, nursery rhymes, learning to count money for my piggy bank and memorizing multiplication tables really are for life as an effective, functional, contributing adult citizen.

The author is able to engage the reader in the subject of religious studies, without being religious, self-righteous, or condescending. He brings up many more points about basic knowledge of facts and subjects that have been abandoned by the educational system that results in a less-than-informed citizenry and the dire consequences of a population that may end up voting against their own interests.

This is an excellent book, easy to digest and even easier to spread the word about. Read it, think about it and tell others.