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Most of us have opinions about religion. We do not want to be too naive about it, and neither do we want to be overly cynical. It can make toxic conversations in mixed company, and just the opposite in other settings. Understanding it authentically would seem to require authoritative knowledge, and yet at some point in conversation we all end up admitting that religion concerns things which no human is capable of fully grasping. It ultimately concerns the ineffable, and there are many such ineffable things in our lives that we have not yet taken the time to patiently observe and discuss openly. The invitation I extend to you in these pages is an unorthodox guide to religious studies as it exists in the current generation. It is unorthodox because it explores also what makes the field seem irrelevant to most people, how it is more relevant than we can yet realize, and what the field itself could look like in the future. This is a record of attempts to articulate these things, tied to a particular time and place, but this sort of discussion has a way of echoing, resonating, with history. And so this is a book about history, ideals, personal stories, and critical theories that are undoubtedly incomplete. Most of all it is a record of observations and studies, scattered across disciplinary lines, pointing to something nearing completeness. It is an invitation, an introduction, because we will still have far to go once the page count runs out.
