Acknowledgments
Chapter 1 Why Occupy Religion?
Chapter 2 We Are the 99 Percent
Chapter 3 The Multitude Springs into Action
Chapter 4 Theology of the Multitude
Chapter 5 Reimagining the God of the Multitude
Chapter 6 Envisioning the Church of the Multitude
Epilogue
Joerg Rieger is Wendland-Cook Professor of Constructive Theology at
Southern Methodist University. He is the author of numerous books,
including Christ and Empire. He lives in Dallas, Texas.
Kwok Pui-lan is William F. Cole Professor of Christian Theology and
Spirituality at Episcopal Divinity School. She is the most recent
past president of the American Academy of Religion and author of
several books. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
A comprehensive overview of how faith communities responded to the
Occupy Movement, with fascinating asides about the faith and
spirituality tent in Boston, where Zen Buddhists, Muslims, and Jews
held prayers and services.
*Publishers Weekly*
The Occupy Wall Street movement, as it pertains to theology, is
examined here. The authors communicate clearly and compellingly as
they offer examples from the Occupy events that provoke religious
consideration and illustrate Occupy’s possible influences in the
religious theater. The volume also looks back at Liberation
theology and how some of the events of the 1960s had religious
overtones. The Occupy theology concept, as delineated here, seems
to offer new ways to define justice, opportunities to discover the
divine through human diversity (including religious diversity), and
pathways to authentically participative religion. The text’s
discussion of historic underpinnings will assist the reader new to
this field, while those familiar with the work of Hans Kung and
Paulo Freire will appreciate grappling with this new focus.
*Booklist*
In Occupy Religion two Christian theologians offer observations
concerning the Occupy movement that swept through many American
cities in 2011 and 2012. Rieger (Southern Methodist Univ.) and
Pui-lan (Episcopal Divinity School) discuss the implications they
find in that movement for religious thought generally and for
Christian theology in particular. Adopting the Occupy movement's
insistence that society is divided into the 1 percent and the 99
percent, they describe the latter as the "multitude," a group whose
protest is legitimate and long overdue. The core of their thesis is
presented in chapters on the God of the multitude and the church of
the multitude. Therein they argue for an immanent God and a church
of inclusion that is not restricted by time and space. The Occupy
movement's claims regarding itself tend to be taken rather
uncritically. Not all readers will find convincing this book's use
of the Occupy movement as a kind of metaphor for all contemporary
movements of social and economic protest. Nonetheless, this volume
does offer thought-provoking observations on what a convincing
contemporary image of God might be and on how a viable church might
be shaped for the 21st century. Summing Up: Recommended.
Researchers/faculty, professionals/practitioners, and general
readers.
*CHOICE*
Authors Kwok Pui-lan and Joerg Rieger seek to convey the
'subversive and transforming power of the God incarnate' at work in
the midst of 21st-century income inequality. Think of it as
liberation theology 2.0.
True to the theology it proposes, this book does not take a
top-down view, but rather observes how the divine is emerging from
the ground up. The authors provide an offering for our own
reflection, resonance and participation. Because much of the
content is experiential, readers without a formal theological
background will find the language and ideas accessible.
*National Catholic Reporter*
It is easy to conclude that the Occupy movement was a flash in the
pan, enacted by disgruntled people without a plan or staying power,
a passing whim to be forgotten. This book insists otherwise. Its
authors are peculiarly equipped to make the argument. Joerg Rieger,
professor of theology at Southern Methodist University, has
produced a series of important studies on the role of empire in the
imagination and interpretation of the Western theological
tradition. Kwok Pui-lan, professor of theology and spirituality at
Episcopal Divinity School, is at the forefront of a postcolonial
hermeneutics that both exposes the hegemony of empire and thinks
outside that hegemony for alternative possibilities. These authors
are of immense importance and are not as well-known as they deserve
to be. Rieger and Kwok situate the Occupy movement in a global
context and subject the movement and its resisters to acute
theological commentary. Rieger and Kwok entertain the thought that
the Occupy movement, a modest global awakening, is a chance that a
church that is too much formed by the transnational capitalist
class will notice its natural constituency elsewhere. They conclude
with the recognition that the theologies of the empire are
'finished theologies.' The work of the multitude, however, is an
unfinished theology that thrives among those who rally around Moses
and Jesus.
*The Christian Century*
The author's deftly engage social, economic, and political dynamics
through the lens of the Occupy movement.
*Anglican and Episcopal History*
This book should be read by anyone interested in intersections of
religion and political dissent.... [N]ot only does this book
provide important contributions to the study of the Occupy movement
and intersections of religion and political dissent, it also opens
out wider sociological questions about religion, organization and
transmission, and religion and modernity.... [I]ts contribution to
religion and social theory is certain.
*Critical Research on Religion*
Engaged theology at its best: passionate, articulate, and informed
by deep knowledge of tradition and awareness of the pressing
realities of contemporary political and personal life. A splendid
resource for students, their teachers, and all who search for the
sacred in a world of destructive economic and political
domination.
*Roger S. Gottlieb, author of A Greener Faith: Religious
Environmentalism and our Planet's Future*
Occupy Religion is a brilliantly unfinished book of theology that
constantly opens a door to a new hope for multitude. In line with
the Social Gospel movement and the Civil Rights movement, this book
involves the church in the Occupy Movement for the sake of 99
percent of the US population. With the aspiration of foretasting
the just and compassionate Reign of God in the United States and
the rest of the world, this new theological movement emerges from
the 'deep solidarity' with the people of the Occupy Movement, a
fundamental challenge to the present practice of neoliberal
American capitalism. I highly recommend this book to all justice
loving Christians.
*Andrew Sung Park, author of From Hurt to Healing, professor of
theology at United Theological Seminary*
Inspired by the global mass protests of 2011, Occupy Religion
proposes a Theology of the Multitude that challenges traditional
ways of thinking about religion, transcendence, and the ecclesial
community. The significance and the reach of these global mass
protests of 2011 will be on-going. By suggesting there is a
symbiotic relationship between the 1% and the 99%, Rieger and Kwok
contest religious concepts that have been used to reinforce the
top-down domination of the 1%. Occupy Religion is a must read for
those of us concerned with the confluence of religion and the logic
of to-down domination as well as for those resisting and working
with a vision that another world is possible!
*Wonhee Anne Joh, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary*
This compelling, comprehensive look at the spiritual heart of the
Occupy movement not only issues a challenge to those trapped
in liberal, modern understandings of religion, but it also captures
Occupy’s rich possibilities for global transformation and new
theologies. It places faith right where it belongs: in the public
spheres that ought to serve justice for all, to protect human
rights and freedom, and to promote a common good and sustainable
life on earth.
*Rita Nakashima Brock, Brite Divinty School, coauthor of Saving
Paradise, and member of Occupy Oakland*
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