Can critical research on religion offer both an ideology critique and a critical retrieval of religious import? This article suggests that it can, offering a programmatic sketch for a full-fledged critique of religion—a critique both aimed at religion and inspired by religion in a self-critical fashion. The sketch weds elements of a robustly normative critique of Western society with insights derived from the Frankfurt School. First the article maps three societal macrostructures that organize much of contemporary social life—civil society, proprietary (...) economy, and administrative state. Then it discusses solidarity, resourcefulness, and justice as societal principles that can sustain a critique of societal macrostructures. Next it identifies normative deficiencies within and between these macrostructures. On the basis of this architectonic critique, the article then provides an account of religion in its critical and utopian roles. It concludes by envisioning a normative and emancipatory transformation of society as a whole. (shrink)

Throughout the Homo Sacer series, Giorgio Agamben takes seriously the political and philosophical significance of Christian ritual in his archaeology of Western political discourse. In Opus Dei, Agamben argues for the sacrifice of the Mass as the paradigm for the ontology of effectivity, an ontology he sees as still regnant in the West. This ontology depends on the discourse of duty or office, and it begins with the priestly office. The priest’s duty is to be an “animate instrument” in the (...) Mass. However, Agamben’s archaeology contains a massive gap between scholastic theology and Enlightenment political theory—the Protestant Reformation. I argue that Agamben’s hypothesis requires attending to the reformation of the Mass. Examining the works of Luther and Zwingli, I show that in spite of their rejection of the priesthood, the discourse of duty and operativity not only persists but expands through their respective sacramental theologies. (shrink)

The Japanese “new religions” active in Kinshasa nearly all perform healing through the channeling of invisible divine light. In the case of Sekai Kyūseikyō, the light of Johrei cannot be visually apprehended, but is worn as an invisible aura on the practitioner’s body. This article discusses the trans-cultural resonances between Japan and Central Africa regarding the ontology of spiritual force, regimes of subjectivity, and the gradual embodiment of Johrei divine light as a protection against witchcraft. Meanwhile, I argue that religious (...) multiplicity in urban Africa encourages cultural reflexivity about concepts of health and healing, self-responsibility, and Pentecostal suspicion-mongering of occult sciences. Thus, Johrei divine light not only feeds into a longstanding local tradition of spiritual healing; within the religiously multiple city, it is also a discursive space for, and an experience and performance of, emic critique. (shrink)