- Title
- As cunning as serpents and as innocent as doves: towards a worldly left
- Creator
- Boer, Roland
- Relation
- New Politics Vol. 12, Issue 3, p. 58-67
- Relation
- http://newpol.org/node/70
- Publisher
- New Politics
- Resource Type
- journal article
- Date
- 2009
- Description
- The thesis of this essay is as follows: since the religious left has been marginalized and has had the Bible stolen from it, and since the secular left is on the rise, we need a politics of alliance between the religious left and the old secular left. I call this alliance the “worldly left,” one that is as cunning as serpents and as innocent as doves. Before I go any further, let me clarify my terms. By “religious left” I mean those who struggle within the synagogue and church for justice and who find elements within their traditions as an inspiration for their struggles. They include both the reformers and the revolutionaries. Even though my preferences lie with the revolutionaries — the sundry Christian and Jewish socialists, communists, and anarchists — for a politics of alliance the religious left also includes the reformers, those who prefer to tinker with the system in order to improve it in one way or another. This is where many of those who struggle for queer, gender, indigenous, and environmental justice may be found. By “(old) secular left” I mean the various socialists, communists and anarchists who are deeply suspicious of religion of any stripe, especially Judaism and Christianity. They still follow the old model of secularism which they understand as anti-religious, indeed as atheistic. Such a position may have been fine in 19th century politics, but it cuts off some extremely valuable allies and hobbles the programs of the left.
- Subject
- religious left; secular left; revolutionaries; secularism
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/916712
- Identifier
- uon:8086
- Identifier
- ISSN:0028-6494
- Language
- eng
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