Here’s a new book about the increasing importance of religion as a consideration in American foreign policy. Another piece of evidence–in this case in the geopolitical sphere–against the view that religion would steadily decrease in relevance with the progress of time. The book is Finding Faith in Foreign Policy: Religion and American Diplomacy in a Post-Secular World (Oxford University Press), by Gregorio Bettiza.
“Since the end of the Cold War, religion has become an ever more explicit and systematic focus of US foreign policy across multiple domains. US foreign policymakers, for instance, have been increasingly tasked with monitoring religious freedom and promoting it globally, delivering humanitarian and development aid abroad by drawing on faith-based organizations, fighting global terrorism by seeking to reform Muslim societies and Islamic theologies, and advancing American interests and values more broadly worldwide by engaging with religious actors and dynamics. Simply put, religion has become a major subject and object of American foreign policy in ways that were unimaginable just a few decades ago.
In Finding Faith in Foreign Policy, Gregorio Bettiza explains the causes and consequences of this shift by developing an original theoretical framework and drawing upon extensive empirical research and interviews. He argues that American foreign policy and religious forces have become ever more inextricably entangled in an age witnessing a global resurgence of religion and the emergence of a postsecular world society. He further shows how the boundaries between faith and state have been redefined through processes of desecularization in the context of American foreign policy, leading the most powerful state in the international system to intervene and reshape in increasingly sustained ways sacred and secular landscapes around the globe.
Drawing from a rich evidentiary base spanning twenty-five years, Finding Faith in Foreign Policy details how a wave of religious enthusiasm has transformed not just American foreign policy, but the entire international system.”
We’re a little late getting to this, but we close out the week with a collection of essays that appeared last fall, honoring Catholic University of America historian Kenneth Pennington, 
Here are some important law-and-religion news stories from around the web:
To say that we have yet another book to post on religious and political divides in America sounds a bit sarcastic, but I don’t mean it that way. The fact that so many serious books are appearing on polarization in America reflects something that all of us recognize. Deep fissures are appearing in our culture and no one knows quite what to do about them–assuming that we want to do something about them, which also is unclear. A new book from Brookings, 
Last October, I posted a new biography of 
Being a bishop has not always been a safe job. In late antiquity, in fact, it could be positively dangerous–as it remains in some parts of the world today. Not surprisingly, bishops sometimes survived Roman persecution by fleeing (or worse–see the Donatist Controversy), which occasioned considerable consternation among the members of the flock who stayed behind. A book out today from the University of California Press, 
Many readers of this blog will know of the famous disagreement between Thomas Jefferson and Joseph Story on whether Christianity formed part of the common law. Jefferson, unsurprisingly, thought the answer was “no.” How he came to that conclusion is perhaps revealed in a new edition of his legal notes,