1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910861075203321

Autore

Kline David (Lecturer in the Religious Studies)

Titolo

Racism and the weakness of Christian identity [[electronic resource] ] : religious autoimmunity / / David Kline

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Abingdon, Oxon ; ; New York, NY, : Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020

ISBN

0-429-19672-5

0-429-58963-8

Edizione

[1st ed.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (229 pages)

Collana

Routledge new critical thinking in religion, theology and biblical studies

Disciplina

261.8

Soggetti

Racism - Religious aspects - Christianity

Violence - Religious aspects - Christianity

Christianity and politics - History of doctrines - Early church, ca. 30-600

Identity (Psychology) - Religious aspects - Christianity

White people - Race identity

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Cover -- Half Title -- Series -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction -- Part I Religion, Christian Identity, and political theology -- 1 Genre, system, observation: Sylvia Wynter and Niklas Luhmann on autopoiesis and religion -- 2 Immunity and autoimmunity: the two sources of religion -- 3 Becoming Christian: Pauline political theology and the apparatus of Christian Identity -- Part II Apparatuses -- 4 Apparatus one: Spanish colonialism and non-Christian bodies as theo-juridical problems -- 5 Apparatus two: anti-blackness and white supremacy in Spanish and English colonialism -- 6 Apparatus three: race and biopolitical intensification in America -- Part III Thinking resistance -- 7 Being's salvation: political ontology, apocalyptic theology, and the apparatus -- 8 The fugitive and the katechon: blackness and pragmatics -- Index.

Sommario/riassunto

Despite the command from Christ to love your neighbour, Western Christianity has continued to be afflicted by the evil of racism and the acts of violence that accompany it. Through a systems theoretical and



deconstructive account of religion and the political theology of St. Paul, this book traces how the racism and violence of modern Western Christianity is a symptom of its failure to secure its own myth of sovereignty within a complex world of plurality. Divided into three sections, the book begins with a philosophical and critical account of what it calls the immune system of Christian identity. Focusing on Pauline political theology as reflective of an inherent religious "autoimmunity" built into Christian community, a theory of theological-political violence is located within Western Christianity. The second section traces major theoretical aspects of the historical "apparatus" of Christian Identity. It demonstrates that it is ultimately around the figure of the black slave that racialized Christian identity becomes a system of anti-blackness and white supremacy. The book concludes by offering strategies for thinking resistance against such racialised Christian identity. It does this by constructing a "pragmatics of faith" by engaging Deleuze's and Guattari's use of the term pragmatics, Moten's theory of black fugitivity, and Long's account of African American religious production. This wide-ranging and interdisciplinary view of Christianity's relationship to racism will be of keen interest to scholars of Religious Studies, Theological Studies, Cultural Studies, Critical Race Studies, American Studies, and Critical Theory.