Khyati Y. JOSHI. White Christian Privilege. The Illusion of Religious Equality in America. New York: New York University Press, 2020. pp. 277. ISBN 9781479840236. Reviewed by Péter TÖRÖK, Károli Gáspár University of the Reformed Church in Hungary.

Reading Khyati Joshi’s White Christian Privilege from the perspective of a white Christian who lived in a country where Christianity was oppressed with full force, and who, consequently, emigrated to North America proved challenging.  I am keenly aware that “white Christian” does not always dovetail with “privilege.”

I was never quite sure who the ’target population’ of the book was intended to be.  For academics, the book is simplistic, offering only a smattering of significant insights about the hegemony of Protestant religions in the US. Yet that academic pathway is well worn, and Joshi provides readers with little that is new. While the author refers throughout her work to “social justice approach”, she does not provide practical tools for those who are or would be engaged in the promotion of social justice. For example, she mentions the existence of guidelines for public events Christian clergy should check before entering so-called “interfaith spaces” (p. 219), yet she does so only in the endnotes – end even there without listing them.

The reader may surmise that the target audience of her book comprises mainly her undergraduate students.  For newcomers to the field of American religion, historical sections book may serve as a decent textbook providing the basic historical and legal context. With this provision, the book might serve as an introduction for the general public in order to enlighten regarding issues of sensitivity.  

Regardless of the uncertainties of the intended audience, there is a problematic issue in her treatment of Christianity’s current status in the public life of the United States. At the beginning of the book, Joshi quotes – without proper page references – Robert Bellah’s formulation of civil religion. Her treatment of this phenomenon, however is superficial and unapologetically biased, declaring that there is “nothing 'civil' about it” (p. 23). Moreover, in her view, civil religion in the United States along with “the false notion of secularization, and the popularity of nominally inclusive religious terminology all operate together to hide Christian norms in plain sight” (p. 24).  The images and activities used by civil religion “have clearly religious meanings, symbolisms, and antecedents that are self-evident to non-Christians” (p. 24). Later on, however, she herself concedes, that at least for those taking an oath of office one of those symbols, the Bible, “is considered a document with civic meaning, rather than only a reflection of the swearer’s private religion” (p. 142).  It is puzzling how and why Joshi could not see that civil religion fits very well into, and supports her overall thesis, that (White) Christianity is part and parcel of the American society.  Furthermore, including civil religion among her analytical tools, it would have raised relevant and significant questions: e.g. what do these symbols and events mean to non-Christians, or why and how, or to what extent do they affect non-Christians’ ideas in a similar way to that of Christians?

While the reader may welcome and find useful sections of the book, the overall treatment of the subject leaves some dissatisfaction.  I wholeheartedly agree with Joshi that we need a change in the paradigm about religion, nevertheless, a more thorough analysis of the phenomenon of White Christian supremacy in the United States would have probably contributed better to her more achievable desired changes.