More on Inclusive Pluralism

I have written about Richard Grigg before, because I think his To Re-enchant the World; A Philosophy of Unitarian Universalism contains important insights into the power of a Unitarian Universalist religious congregation to support spiritual development and support the formation of a new way of being religious.  Grigg introduces the concept of inclusive pluralism which he believes is a characteristic of communities that allow multiple ways of being religious and in which the individuals in that society are permitted to be influenced by those multiple ways of being religious.  Now that ck over at ArbitraryMarks is writing about pluralism, I thought I would post again on this topic.

On the other hand a society may have multiple religious communities in which the members respect each others right to practice an alternative religion, but in which boundaries are maintained.  He argues that that society practices exclusive pluralism.  He argues that contemporary North American society is decidedly pluralistic, there are many religions and they interact with one another, but an individual is expected to pick one religion to the exclusion of all others.  Most Americans would find a Unitarian Universalist who said:  "I am a earth centered religious humanist who is deeply involved in both Native American liberation theology and Unitarian Universalist Christianity" to be sort of weird, indecisive, and hopelessly eclectic.  But there is a difference between eclecticism and allowing oneself the participate in more than one religious path and permitting ones spirituality to be formed by multiple centers.  Eclectics borrow from here and there, without respecting the integrity of the various sources from which they appropriate.  But one may have an integrated spiritual life and be influence by quite discrete religious centers.

Grigg writes of two societies:
We find a clear example of inclusive pluralism among the ancient Greeks.  Greek religion operated on multiple levels, and a single individual could participate at each level.  For example, there were rites performed at a family altar.  There were sacrifices and rituals that were the provence of an entire city.  There were rituals on behalf of the Greeks as a whole (the famous games at Olympia, for example, centered around sacrifice to a god.)  In addition to all of this, in the later part of Ancient Greek history, an individual Greek might well choose to join one of the "mystery religions,"so called because they involved secret initiations and the transmission of mysteries, mysteries often tied to a successful journey through the underworld after death.  One might join a mystery cult dedicated to Dionysus, or Demeter, or Mithras.  This is an "inclusive pluralism," then, because it is constituted many religious sites and practices, but an individual can happily participate in any number of them.  He or she is not forced to pick just one religion out of the pluralistic milieu and embrace it as his or her sole spiritual path.
and then there is Japan where:
"[O]ne can have a Shinto wedding and a Buddhist funeral.  There is no sense of religions being wholly discrete institutional entitities whose boundaries prevent participation in more one religion at a time."