Page 256 - Religion in the Media Age Media, Religion & Culture

Public religious culture post-09/11/01 245

of mourning, of contention with shared fear and loss. Critical questions
about the legitimacy of the state, not just about the status of a leader such
as Kennedy, are in play, and the whole question of the function of such an
event in support of social order is also in question. Second, whereas Dayan
and Katz tend to sidestep the implicit religiosity of these events (while very
persuasively describing the role that explicit religious form plays in them), I
want to look more directly at the way that religious sentiments, sensibili-
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ties, and meanings come into play in them. Dayan and Katz tend to see
the role of religion in such events as either a legitimating authority or as a
source of formal elements that are brought into play in the structuration of
the events. So the approach here is at some distance from their analysis,
following instead Robert Bellah’s influential ideas about the function of
civil religion. To Bellah, civil religion is something that, while existing in
secularized public contexts, nonetheless seeks to infuse those contexts with
deeper and more profound meanings. Bellah notes: “American civil religion
is not the worship of the American nation but an understanding of the
American experience in the light of ultimate and universal reality.” 31
Bellah’s own work outlined ways in which formal and informal contexts of
public ritual have traditionally been infused with such themes and values. 32
Often these have been seen as somewhat denatured, including things such
as seemingly rote prayers and invocations at sporting and political events. A
vibrant debate has continued in popular culture over whether and what
kind of popular-cultural materials might be serving such civic piety, and
whether it would be delegitimated by its commodification or diluted by its
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over-application. I want to contend that, in events like 9/11, the media
have come to play a central role in civil religious practices that are
authentic to critical moments in national self-understanding.
This argument rests, of course, on the notion that media can be signifi-
cant in providing the context for the crafting of novel ways of making such
meanings. Many have suggested such an organic role for media and for
media rituals. A formal argument to this effect relies of course on the
notion that significant ritualization can take place beyond specifically reli-
gious contexts and, further, in media contexts. Ritual scholar Catherine
Bell has noted that evolving understandings and practices of ritual have in
fact broken some of the key boundaries of religious sanction, leading to
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“new styles of ritualization.” Ronald Grimes has explored at some length
the notion that the media can be at the center of such ritualization. Noting
that ritualization may or may not be “religious” in some fundamental way,
he observes that media can function as ritual. At the same time, he
cautions that there is nothing necessarily ritually significant about media.
Consistent with Geertz’s ideas about religion, it depends, to Grimes, on the
particular moments, meanings, and practices. 35
Powerful political and national narratives and sentiments, such as those
that might be invoked by an event like 9/11, have been traditionally