Passing on the Faith ................. 16218$ $$FM 11-06-06 09:59:49 PS PAGE i The Abrahamic Dialogues Series David B. Burrell, series editor Donald Moore, Martin Buber: Prophet of Religious Secularism James L. Heft, ed., Beyond Violence: Religious Sources of Social Transformation in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam Rusmir Mahmutc´ehajic´, Learning from Bosnia: Approaching Tradition Rusmir Mahmutc´ehajic´, The Mosque: The Heart of Submission Alain Marchadour and David Neuhaus, The Land, the Bible, and History: Toward the Land That I Will Show You ................. 16218$ $$FM 11-06-06 09:59:49 PS PAGE ii i>À}Passing vÀon the Ã> Faith Transforming««À>V } Traditions /À>`Ì for the Next Generation of Jews, Christians, and Muslims 2USMIR -AHMUTCEHAJIC Edited by James L. Heft, S.M. /À>Ã>Ìi` LÞ ->L> ,Ã>Õ`` >` À>Và ,° ià &ORDHAM 5NIVERSITY 0RESS .EW 9ORK Óääx2006 ................. 16218$ $$FM 11-06-06 09:59:49 PS PAGE iii Copyright ᭧ 2006 Fordham University Press All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher. The Abrahamic Dialogues Series, No. 6 ISSN 1548-4130 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Passing on the faith : transforming traditions for the next generation of Jews, Christians, and Muslims / edited by James L. Heft.—1st ed. p. cm.—(The Abrahamic dialogues series no. 5) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978-0-8232-2647-4 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-8232-2647-6 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN-13: 978-0-8232-2648-1 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-8232-2648-4 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Monotheism. 2. Judaism. 3. Christianity. 4. Islam. I. Heft, James. BL221.P37 2006 207Ј.5—dc22 2006035677 Printed in the United States of America 08070654321 First edition ................. 16218$ $$FM 11-06-06 09:59:49 PS PAGE iv Contents Preface ix James L. Heft, S.M. Introduction: Youth and the Continuity of Religious Traditions 1 James L. Heft, S.M. Section One:National and International Overviews Looking for God: Religious Indifference in Perspective 23 Melchor Sa´nchez de Toca Journeys of Faith: Meeting the Challenges in Twenty- First-Century America 37 Nancy Ammerman Section Two:Three Recent National Studies Is Moralistic Therapeutic Deism the New Religion of American Youth? Implications for the Challenge of Religious Socialization and Reproduction 55 Christian Smith ................. 16218$ CNTS 11-06-06 09:59:52 PS PAGE v vi / Contents The ‘‘Interior’’ Lives of American College Students: Preliminary Findings from a National Study 75 Jennifer A. Lindholm Congregations That Get It: Understanding Religious Identities in the Next Generation 103 Tobin Belzer, Richard W. Flory, Nadia Roumani, and Brie Loskota Section Three:Passing on the Faith to the Next Generation of Jews BJ: A Portrait of a Revitalized Synagogue 125 Rabbi J. Rolando Matalon Current Expressions of American Jewish Identity: An Analysis of 114 Teenagers 135 Philip Schwadel Section Four:Passing on the Faith to the Next Generation of Christians A Spiritual Crossroads of Europe: The Taize´ Community’s Adventure with the Young 147 Brother John of Taize´ Religious Identity and Belonging Amidst Diversity and Pluralism: Challenges and Opportunities for Church and Theology 162 Peter C. Phan Section Five:Passing on the Faith to the Next Generation of Muslims Identity and Community in a New Generation: The Muslim Community in the Early Seventh Century and Today 187 Ghada Osman Making Safe Space for Questioning for Young American Muslims 204 Amira Quraishi ................. 16218$ CNTS 11-06-06 09:59:52 PS PAGE vi Contents / vii Second-Generation Muslim Immigrants in Detroit Mosques: The Second Generation’s Search for Their Place and Identity in the American Mosque 218 Ihsan Bagby Section Six:Two Evaluations of the Research The Leisure of Worship and the Worship of Leisure 247 Jack Miles Teach Your Children Well: Closing Observations on Constructing Religious Identity in the Next Generation 264 Diane Winston Notes 275 Contributors 295 Index 301 ................. 16218$ CNTS 11-06-06 09:59:52 PS PAGE vii ................. 16218$ CNTS 11-06-06 09:59:52 PS PAGE viii Preface James L. Heft, S.M. The chapters of this book were originally given in somewhat different form as papers at an international conference held at the University of Southern California in October 2004. The conference, ‘‘Faith, Fear and Indifference: Constructing the Religious Identity of the Next Genera- tion,’’ drew speakers from Europe and North America, and focused pri- marily on how three religious traditions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—pass on their religious traditions to their youth in the context of the contemporary culture of the United States. The conference itself would not have been possible without the generous support of the Lilly Endowment; the University of Southern California’s College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, and its Center for the Study of Religion and Civic Culture; the Omar Ibn Al Khattab Foundation; the Institute for Ad- vanced Catholic Studies; Peter and Merle Mullin; Ruth Ziegler; Mark and Peachy Levy; The Angell Foundation; the Wilsey Foundation; and Thomas and Katie Eggemeier, Jr. Without the wise counsel and con- stant support of Rabbi Reuven Firestone of Hebrew Union College; Professor Don Miller, the director of the Center for the Study of Reli- gion and Civic Culture; Dafer Dakhil, the executive director of the Omar Ibn Al Khattab Foundation; Rabbi Susan Laemmle, Dean of Reli- gious Life at the University of Southern California; and Brie Loskota, the conference director, this conference could not have happened. Preparation for the publication of this volume is largely the result of the superb editing skills of Carol Farrell, my excellent assistant. Dr. ................. 16218$ PREF 11-06-06 09:59:55 PS PAGE ix x / Preface Donald Wigal prepared the subject and author index, which provides easy access to the contents of the volume. I am also grateful to the won- derful support of the University of Southern California for a whole se- ries of initiatives that allow for the careful study of religions and interreligious dialogue. This kind of study is just one of the key re- search agendas of the Institute for Advanced Catholic Studies, which played a key role in organizing the conference and seeing this book through to publication. ................. 16218$ PREF 11-06-06 09:59:55 PS PAGE x Passing on the Faith ................. 16218$ HFTL 11-06-06 09:59:58 PS PAGE xi ................. 16218$ HFTL 11-06-06 09:59:58 PS PAGE xii Introduction:Youth and the Continuity of Religious Traditions James L. Heft, S.M. Jaroslav Pelikan, the well-known Yale historian of Christian doctrine, worried whether his grandchildren would have a religious tradition to reject. So pervasive did he consider the acidic effects of modern West- ern culture on religion that he feared that communities of faith would, over the coming generation or two, simply dissolve. Historians are rarely given to apocalyptic prediction; rather, they typically warn us about repeating the history from which we have never learned. But Peli- kan has not been the only person who has worried about religion’s fu- ture in the West. Religious leaders and sociologists and theologians have been asking similar questions: Is the latest generation of young people simply absent from traditional congregations? Isn’t it naı¨ve to think they will return to the congregations they were raised in once they marry and have their own children? Will the future be populated instead by people who think of themselves as ‘‘spiritual but not religious’’? Will the virtual world of iPods and electronic information and enter- tainment replace face-to-face communities? To attract young people back to their religious traditions, is it necessary to perform extreme makeovers on those traditions, adapting them to the visual, audio, and entertainment patterns of many young people in the West? Rabbi Reuven Firestone of Hebrew Union College in Los Angeles, Rabbi Susan Laemmle, the Dean of Religious Life at the University of ................. 16218$ INTR 11-06-06 10:00:01 PS PAGE 1 2 / Introduction Southern California, Dafer Dakhil, the executive director of the Omar Ibn Al Khattab Foundation in Los Angeles, Professor Don Miller of USC’s Center for the Study of Civic Religion, and Fr. James L. Heft, S.M., president of the Institute for Advanced Catholic Studies at the University of Southern California, began discussing these issues in spring 2003. While no one in this group disputed the data that showed that quite a few young people in the United States disassociate them- selves from the religious traditions in which they were raised, they all knew that in the three religious traditions they personally represented— Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—a number of congregations have suc- cessfully resisted the declining trend. That is to say, a number of religious congregations have found ways of remaining connected with their youth. As a group, they decided to organize an international con- ference held in October 2004 at the University of Southern California. It was entitled ‘‘Faith, Fear and Indifference: Constructing the Religious Identity of the Next Generation.’’ Don Miller and Jim Heft described the seriousness of the current situation in a proposal submitted to the Lilly Endowment: Christianity in the West is on the threshold of a seismic shift over the next quarter century. In spite of the fact that a considerable number of teens and young adults are interested in spirituality, including mystical revelation and supernatural events, they are relatively indifferent to institutional religion, except for a minor- ity who are energized by various expressions of fundamentalist religion.