Dr. Matthew Hotham of the Philosophy and Religious Studies department will facilitate a conversation on the topic of "Religion, Morality, and the Covid Crisis" via Zoom on Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. as part of the Phil/Rels Conversations series. Join the discussion on Zoom.
Many Americans link morality with religion. In 2011, the Pew Research Center found that 49% of Americans felt that you needed to believe in God to be moral. That number dropped to 42% by 2017. The Covid-19 public health emergency has highlighted major differences in what Americans think it means to be religious and what it means to act morally. Over the past year and a half, religious actors—especially certain kinds of Protestant Christians—have used the tools and terms of religious liberty to advocate for individual liberty over collective responsibility. Meanwhile, some of the most vocal advocates for collective responsibility have been secular, explicitly non-religious figures like scientists, government officials, and university professors. In this conversation, we’ll discuss the relationship between religion and morality in the time of Covid-19 and explore how Covid might reshape what it means to be moral in the contemporary world.