For decades now, Americans have believed that their country is deeply
divided by "culture wars" waged between religious conservatives and
secular liberals. In most instances, Protestant conservatives have been
cast as the instigators of such warfare, while religious liberals have
been largely ignored. In this book, L. Benjamin Rolsky examines the ways
in which American liberalism has helped shape cultural conflict since
the 1970s through the story of how television writer and producer Norman
Lear galvanized the religious left into action.
The creator of comedies such as All in the Family and Maude, Lear
was spurred to found the liberal advocacy group People for the American
Way in response to the rise of the religious right. Rolsky offers
engaged readings of Lear's iconic sitcoms and published writings,
considering them as an expression of what he calls the spiritual
politics of the religious left. He shows how prime-time television
became a focus of political dispute and demonstrates how Lear's
emergence as an interfaith activist catalyzed ecumenical Protestants,
Catholics, and Jews who were determined to push back against
conservatism's ascent. Rolsky concludes that Lear's political
involvement exemplified religious liberals' commitment to engaging
politics on explicitly moral grounds in defense of what they saw as the
public interest. An interdisciplinary analysis of the definitive
cultural clashes of our fractious times, The Rise and Fall of the
Religious Left foregrounds the foundational roles played by popular
culture, television, and media in America's religious history.