Frameworks & Approaches

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The following “big ideas” frame how we engage the work of studying issues on religion and public life. These approaches help set the tone for our community, they cultivate our character and prepare us to encounter different perspectives.

• Chartered Pluralism: 3Rs of Religious Liberty

  At ReligionAndPublicLife.org, learners are encouraged to apply the legal theories “chartered pluralism” and the “3Rs of religious liberty,” as articulated in the Williamsburg Charter. It was signed by on...

• Count to Five

  A healthy democracy does not require agreement—but democracy is strengthened when groups share mutual understanding of one another’s views.  Let’s do a thought experiment. Imagine there is an equal di...

• Moral Imagination

  Our divisions over issues of religion and public life are a result of a failure of imagination––our lack of the moral Imagination. The moral imagination is the ability to picture yourself in the middle of a ...

• Mutual Understanding

  To understand another’s perspective is to accurately interpret their views, intentions, and to empathetically comprehend another’s standpoint. This course requires that every student seek mutual understandin...

• Otherizing

  The seven forms of “otherizing,” as defined by Robert J. Schreiter:  1. We can demonize the other, treating the other as someone to be feared and eliminated if possible.  2. We can, on the other ha...

• Standpoint

  Throughout this ReligionAndPublicLife.org, you are encouraged to listen for the standpoints of others and to refine your own.  Standpoint theory defines the “perspectives acquired from one’s lived life... ...

• The 5 Cs of News

  Professor Helio Garcia classified five things that journalists find interesting, which he calls the “5C’s of News. He states that nearly all news reports have some element of  1. Conflict: A dispute or ...

• The Danger of a Single Story

  As part of a TedTalk, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie speaks of the danger of the single story. She recounts the time when she met her college roommate for the first time.  “I left Nigeria to go to university in th...