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push forward debates about the interaction between religion and ethnicity. And in many cases,
religion plays exactly these kinds of legitimizing and sacralizing roles. But ultimately, these are
instrumental roles. By treating religion as a support for ethnicity they downplay the role that
religion itself often plays in constituting ethnicity and reproducing power.
Religion as the Fabric of Ethnicity
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The content of a specific religion may have an important impact on how a certain ethnic group
thinks of itself and what its core values are. This is important in order not only to understand how
a group conceives of itself, but also its relationships with other groups and the basis of its
members’ actions. In otherwords when religious ideas and values help compose identity and
action, this is a different type of identity and action than one based simply on ideas of shared
kinship and specific national or political ideals. Religious content infuses identities in a variety
of ways. First, religion usually evokes a sense of the sacred. This can add a potent dimension to
the already oppositional nature of identification. In a society with a religious history, it is likely
that theological beliefs, which are intrinsically about good and bad, come into play. This may help
explain why some groups in society are more antagonistic than others. Religion can provide
spiritual resources to explain and justify circumstances and events. Reference to the sacred
may produce an ideological certainty that is difficult to create from other resources. But it is
not simply a oneway relationship where people use religion to legitimize boundaries that are
already there; religious beliefs themselves may partially constitute the boundaries.Second,
religions provide specific ideological concepts that may influence the character of an identity.
Religions have particular doctrinal teachings and moral orientations. Religiously informed
concepts, blended with cultural and historical context, can seep into common-sense
understandings of daily life (Mitchell, 2004). Evangelicalism, for example, has concerns with
sexual morality and an emphasis on individualism (Martin, 1999: 40–2). These concepts of
morality and individualism deeply influence the operationalization of, for example, Korean
American, Nigerian, Venezuelan and Northern Irish evangelical identities. They inform
assumptions about other groups, about work, about public law and so on. Similarly, within Islam
there is a body of legal norms that provide the template for Islamic values and society. In short,
religions offer specific ideological concepts to interpret the social world and define the meaningof
the good life. These ideological concepts may permeate down even to those who are not
religiously devout, but who retain some contact with their religious community.Even when
identities might seem secular, it is worth probing the underlying sources of their constitution
because often latent religious content partially conditions the way an identity functions.
Concepts of Protestant individualism,for example, may inform even nominal Protestants’ selfunderstandings.
As one non-practising Protestant interviewee told Mitchell (2005), her
Protestantism is‘a way of life’ and ‘a personal choice’ that has given her independence, a right to
choose and to think for herself. She presents this in contrast to her Catholic counterparts whom she
says have more pressure and guilt about their religion due to the ‘strictness’ and indoctrination of
Catholic schools. So specific religious concepts can be used to fill up the ethnic category even for
those who present themselves as non-religious.The institutional dimensions of religiously
informed boundaries are also important. Religions are generally accompanied by powerful
institutions thatat tempt to spread their influence. This influence often extends into
education systems and therefore can become a key agency for the transmission of communal
identity. Churches seek to give meaning to people’s political experiences as well as provide
leadership. They offer sanctuary and guidance in times of crisis;and often speak up for morality
and justice against secular states(Casanova, 1994). This can give religiously identified groups a
powerful institutional anchor, agent of socialization, organization and leadership. In addition,
religion can be a very effective facilitator of community. Ritual practices are a key way in
which communities enact their imagined groupness.It is difficult to think of other organizations