Religion on the College Campus

I have often thought our society, including our campuses practice what I would call "thin pluralism."  Pluralism is highly valued but only when we don't take it too seriously. I suspect that in most Property classes taught in the United States, for instance, that most students and faculty would think it odd if a student advocated limits on property rights based on the teachings of her faith. 

In this essay in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Eboo Patel, argues for a thick pluralism where religion and religious perspective are welcome on the college campus. Here are some highlights but read the whole thing:

It came as no surprise to me to read the recent New York Times article indicating that Muslim students feel particularly welcome on Roman Catholic campuses—precisely because of their faith. ... That was my father's experience at the University of Notre Dame 35 years ago. He was a Muslim immigrant from India in the land of gray snow and white Catholics. While the priests didn't always understand his faith, they always respected it, and he felt that the broader environment nurtured it. ...

When I went to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, in the mid-1990s, we were focused on other forms of identity. ... Gender, sexuality, class, and ethnicity all got some airtime, but mostly we talked about race. And one form of identity was almost totally excluded: faith. ...

In the most religiously diverse nation in human history and the most religiously devout nation in the West at a time of global religious conflict, how people from different faith backgrounds get along and what they do together is a crucial question. And so it must be a central question for our public universities as well. ...