Threshold Theology

Abstract

Despite the recent proliferation of “postcolonial theology,” theology itself has had little traction in the broader field of postcolonial studies for a number of reasons: the relationship between colonialism and Christian mission stereotyped Christianity as an agent of the civilizing mission of imperialism; the explosive consequences of the relation between religion and politics has produced prejudice against the inclusion of religion in cultural studies; and the influential doctrine of “secular criticism” espoused by Edward Said has given a strongly humanist complexion to postcolonial studies. The problem with Said’s secularism, wedded, it would seem, to an anachronistic, medieval view of the sacred, is that his stereotyping of religion works against his own definition of a multicultural, multinational inclusive humanism.

Religious enthusiasm is perhaps the most dangerous of threats to the humanistic enterprise, since it is patently anti-secular and antidemocratic in nature, and, in its monotheistic forms as a kind of politics, is by definition about as intolerantly inhumane and downright unarguable as can be.¹