Pilgrimage or Exodus?: Responding to Faculty Faith Diversity at Religiously Affiliated Law Schools

Abstract

Religiously affiliated law schools have, for the most part, given little thought to the integration of faculty members who are from faith communities other than their own. The article will consider the question of how religiously affiliated law schools truly include faculty members of all religious faiths in the development of mission and community in such law schools, using the lens of the religious metaphors of pilgrimage and Exodus. After presenting this typology for critiquing law school practices, the author deconstructs the very premises of the question through the metaphors of pilgrimage and Exodus. The author argues that a proper understanding of the “integration” question requires religiously affiliated schools to acknowledge the true host for their work, which is not – as is commonly assumed – those faculty and staff members whose faith tradition is the same as the law school’s religious affiliation.

Keywords: religiously affiliated law schools, pilgrimage, Exodus, faith communities, faculty members, religious metaphors