In Between Religions

Navigate religious hybridity with a systematic typology and critical framework

As exposure to multiple religious traditions increases, scholars and practitioners face complex questions about religious belonging and identity. In Between Religions: On Religious Hybridity and Belonging surveys arguments for and against multiple religious belonging while offering a systematic typology of religious hybridity. Catherine Cornille, Professor of Comparative Theology at Boston College, examines this phenomenon from both individual and institutional perspectives.

This volume analyzes the constituent components of religious belonging and develops degrees and kinds of religious hybridity into a coherent framework. It maintains a critical realist view of discrete religions while acknowledging fluid boundaries. The final chapter explores how religious traditions themselves can engage constructively with hybridity, offering resources for theological and phenomenological reflection on interreligious engagement.

Readers will find:

• A comprehensive survey of scholarly arguments developed around multiple religious belonging and religious hybridity across diverse traditions and contexts
• Systematic analysis of what religious belonging entails, examining its dimensions and constituent components from phenomenological and theological perspectives
• A strong typology distinguishing various kinds and degrees of religious hybridity for clearer scholarly and practical discussion
• Critical examination of religious hybridity from the self-understanding of religious traditions themselves rather than solely from individual perspectives
• Constructive approaches for how religious traditions can engage with and learn from the phenomenon of religious hybridity

Designed for upper undergraduate and graduate courses in lived religion, interreligious dialogue, multiple religious belonging, religious pluralism, and comparative religion, In Between Religions provides scholars and students with analytical tools for understanding one of contemporary religion's most significant phenomena.

Catherine Cornille is Professor of Comparative Theology at Boston College, where she holds the Newton College Alumnae Chair in Western Culture. Her teaching and publications focus on methodological and phenomenological questions in comparative theology, theology of religions, and interreligious dialogue, with particular attention to the engagement between Christianity and Hinduism. She previously served as Professor of Comparative Religion at KULeuven, Belgium.