Quick Read: Feminism is not a religion

Susan Henking at Religious Dispatches wrote a really interesting article on the recent court case against Columbia University trying to have feminism established as a religion, and thus federal aid for Women's Studies classes were a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. The lawsuit was dismissed, but Henking raises important questions of definitions and why it matters what we call things, especially in a legal setting. Context matters.

She concludes with this:

The plaintiff in the recently dismissed case was making a specious case rooted in a frivolous legal argument. His views are repugnant. Yet, in raising the issue once again of what religion is, he served an important role. While frivolous and meanspirited, his spewing reminds us that the contest is not done. We remain a nation where not all are convinced by the simple argument that women, too, are fully human and that we, like men, are the legitimate topic of academic inquiry. We remain a nation where it does matter how we define religion. Critical engagement with the various contexts within which we (especially in Western culture but increasingly globally) have struggled to understand religion, both as phenomenon and as a category, is as crucial to the our world as Women’s Studies (and feminist work more generally).

It's an interesting article for anyone concerned about intersections of law and religion or religion and feminism.