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This book chronicles and examines the efforts, stories, arguments, and strategies of individuals and organizations doing Muslim anti-domestic violence work in the United States. Looking at connections among ethical practices, gender norms, and religious interpretation, the book demonstrates how Muslim advocates mobilize a rich religious tradition in community efforts against domestic violence, and identify religion and culture as resources or roadblocks to prevent harm and to restore family peace. The book paints a vivid picture of the challenges such advocacy work encounters. The insecurities of American Muslim communities facing intolerance and Islamophobia lead to additional challenges in acknowledging and confronting problems of spousal abuse, and the book reveals how Muslim anti-domestic violence workers combine the methods of the mainstream secular anti-domestic violence movement with Muslim perspectives and interpretations. Identifying a range of Muslim anti-domestic violence approaches, the book argues that at certain times and in certain situations it may be imperative to combat domestic abuse by endorsing notions of “protective patriarchy”—even though service providers may hold feminist views critical of patriarchal assumptions. It links Muslim advocacy efforts to the larger domestic violence crisis in the United States, and shows how, through extensive family and community networks, advocates participate in and further debates about family, gender, and marriage in global Muslim communities. Highlighting the place of Islam as an American religion, the book delves into the efforts made by Muslim Americans against domestic violence and the ways this refashions the society at large.

It is now a common refrain among liberals that Christian Right pastors and television pundits have hijacked evangelical Christianity for partisan gain. This book challenges this notion, arguing that the hijacking metaphor paints a fundamentally distorted picture of how evangelical churches have become politicized. The book reveals how the powerful coalition between evangelicals and the Republican Party is not merely a creation of political elites who have framed conservative issues in religious language, but is anchored in the lives of local congregations. Drawing on research at evangelical churches near the U.S. border with Canada, this book compares how American and Canadian evangelicals talk about politics in congregational settings. While Canadian evangelicals share the same theology and conservative moral attitudes as their American counterparts, their politics are quite different. On the U.S. side of the border, political conservatism is woven into the very fabric of everyday religious practice. The book shows how subtle partisan cues emerge in small group interactions as members define how “we Christians” should relate to others in the broader civic arena, while liberals are cast in the role of adversaries. It explains how the most explicit partisan cues come not from clergy but rather from lay opinion leaders who help their less politically engaged peers to link evangelical identity to conservative politics. This book demonstrates how deep the ties remain between political conservatism and evangelical Christianity in America.

How do American parents pass their religion on to their children? At a time of overall decline of traditional religion and an increased interest in personal “spirituality,” this book investigates the ways that parents transmit religious beliefs, values, and practices to their kids. We know that parents are the most important influence on their children's religious lives, yet parents have been virtually ignored in previous work on religious socialization. The book explores American parents' strategies, experiences, beliefs, and anxieties regarding religious transmission through hundreds of in-depth interviews that span religious traditions, social classes, and family types all around the country. Throughout we hear the voices of evangelical, Catholic, Mormon, mainline and black Protestant, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, and Buddhist parents and discover that, despite massive diversity, American parents share a nearly identical approach to socializing their children religiously. For almost all, religion is important for the foundation it provides for becoming one's best self on life's difficult journey. Religion is primarily a resource for navigating the challenges of this life, not preparing for an afterlife. Parents view it as their job, not religious professionals', to ground their children in life-enhancing religious values that provide resilience, morality, and a sense of purpose. Challenging longstanding sociological and anthropological assumptions about culture, the book demonstrates that parents of highly dissimilar backgrounds share the same “cultural models” when passing on religion to their children.