I've found students pretty sophisticated as to the political issues surrounding how the divine is depicted. I think that in all these cases there is something of real life and relevance to students. I am interested in how religious thought and practice reflects and authorizes various social arrangements of power. I want students to care about issues of ethics and justice. Probably the class I'm teaching right now on consent and coercion.
Consent is a linchpin of modern democracy.
But we haven't looked enough at the connection between religion and consent. Most portrayals of religious conversion use language that suggests coercion. At the same time, consent theorists offered a reinterpretation of religion that made religion into a matter of choice or opinion. I am interested in analyzing these conflicting interpretations of religion. I also have to say that I really enjoyed teaching a first-year seminar.