Our Impact

Failure to understand the power of religion has detrimental consequences across all sectors and endeavors, from local to international levels. Religion and Public Life prepares visionary leaders to confront these consequences by redefining engagement with religion in the public square – mitigating the destructive capacity of religion and enhancing its power to generate compassion, beauty, and justice. We measure our success by how well we are able to advance the public understanding of religion across multiple sectors, creating new opportunities and resources for students, professionals and life-long learners to develop, critically reflect and act upon a deeper understanding of religion in service of a just world at peace.

Voices

Hear how the RPL experience has informed, transformed, and affirmed our fellows’ work.

Case Study: Internet Pujas

Many Hindus practice the puja, a form of worship in which they experience a moment of connection with a deity. Online puja services give global access to Hindu temples.

Impact Story: Religious Education through New Eyes

Fellow in Education John Camardella, a teacher at Prospect High School in Illinois, helps his students use fashion, space, and travel to understand world faiths.

Teacher at the front of a class full of high school students

Stories

We Who Believe in Freedom Cannot Rest: Creating Space for an Honest Reckoning Through Religion and the Legacies of Slavery

July 10, 2023

“That which touches me most is that I had a chance to work with people Passing onto others that which was passed onto me. Not needing to clutch for power. Not needing the light just to shine on me. I need to be one in the number as we stand against...

Religion and the Legacies of Slavery Poster Thumbnail

Religious Literacy Belongs in the Climate Justice Classroom: HDS Alum and Educator Empowers Students by Bringing RPL Frameworks to Life

May 17, 2023

“Part of our work around solving or responding to the environmental crisis we're facing is understanding the assumptions and the stories that we carry into it,” says Lara Freeman, religious studies teacher at Westtown School outside Philadelphia. Freeman...

Lara Freeman, MTS '06, religious literacy teacher at Westtown School

Two Gals in Pal: Leveraging TikTok to Bring Stories from Palestine to Americans

September 22, 2022

What’s the recipe for nuanced attention to complex issues like Israel/Palestine? For two Harvard Divinity School students (one who graduated last spring), it’s a strategy of consistent content on a newly launched TikTok account that surpassed half a...

Sami and Ciara hipbump on a street with colorful umbrellas hanging overhead

Sustaining and Documenting Co-Resistance: A Conversation between RCPI Fellows Mati Milstein and Oriel Eisner

July 05, 2022

Through a photo documentation project in the complex area of the South Hebron Hills in Area C of the West Bank, two Harvard Divinity School fellows uncovered layered Jewish identities of activists in solidarity with Palestinians, including within...

Milstein and Eisner in the South Hebron Hills, L (2020)

Video: Educator Webinar: Religious Literacy and Nurses' Stories in the Age of COVID and Anti-Asian Hate

July 24, 2023

On May 8, 2023, Religion and Public Life program at Harvard Divinity School hosted a conversation with Professor Aprilfaye Manalang of Norfolk State University to learn about her ongoing research on religious identity, grief, and COVID with Filipina...

Speakers Professor Aprilfaye Manalang, Jeanne Shin-Cooper, and Shin-Cooper's student Audrey Ro for the Educator Webinar: Religious Literacy and Nurses' Stories in the Age of COVID and Anti-Asian Hate

Video: Religious Literacy and Climate Justice

May 11, 2023

On April 14, 2023, Religion and Public Life Fellows with expertise in policy, environmental science, Native and Indigenous rights, and education discussed the ways religious and spiritual literacy can enhance policy and scientific efforts to understand...