Wednesday, October 7, 2015, 7pm, Hagerty Hall [Rm. 180], 1775 College Rd.

Abstract:

“The United States increasingly is hostile to people of faith.”

“Christians constitute a persecuted church in America.”

Claims such as these have become central to the political rhetoric of the U.S. Christian conservative movement, especially as Christian conservatives contest the civil rights of gender and sexual minorities in the U.S. and the idea of sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) human rights throughout the world. It is possible to use the political rhetoric of Christian conservative opinion leaders to delineate contemporary Christian Right principles of human rights. These principles provide Christian conservatives with an ideological roadmap to identify with a body of believers persecuted for their faith by the extension to LGBTQ people of civil and human rights. In this way, Christian conservatives come to reject the category of SOGI human rights and oppose efforts to protect the human rights of LGBTQ people.

Professor Cynthia Burack of the Department of Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies will deliver the second talk in the 2015-2016 “Religions of the World: Past and Present” Community Lecture series. Her lecture, like all others in the Center for the Study of Religion-sponsored series, is free and open to all. There will be a brief question-and-answer session and a reception following the lecture.

Sponsored by OSU Center for the Study of Religion, 614-688-8010.