RE 190: World Religions

This class helps students expand beyond their own religious tradition in order to see the way other traditions view their worlds and explore how religion can be understood as a reflection of attempts to comprehend the human condition. In this course, we examine Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Chinese Traditions, alongside a select number of additional traditional and new religious movements to reflect the diversity inherent in religious experiences across the globe. Using the lived experience of religion as a launching point, we compare and contrast these religions and critically examine texts from each one to illuminate how misunderstandings about religion can easily arise. We pay particular attention to the ways that historical practices and beliefs are present in contemporary expressions of religious identity.