Description: Since the 1980s, religion has been most visible in American public life when issues of sexuality and reproduction are at stake. Paradoxically, however, the voices that speak most loudly in the name of religion are often unschooled in religious history, world religions, theology, or ethics. As a result, religion in America is misrepresented as anxiously and obsessively concerned with sex, and as uniformly supporting the conservative agenda of "family values." This volume corrects that distortion in American public discourse. Its thirteen articles introduce scholarly perspectives on issues including the family, gay rights, abortion, welfare policy, prostitution, and assisted reproduction. They display the complexities and conflicts that exist both between and within America's various religious traditions -- for example, the pro-choice strain within Christian history, the support of many religious denominations for gay rights, and the criticism of patriarchal family structures within religious communities past and present. Here, contributors put forth views of sexual ethics that are compassionate, respectful of cultural pluralism, and attentive to democratic processes. The result is an anthology that will debunk the claims of the Religious Right to be the only "religious" word on sexuality in America.

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