Interfaith Identity In The Nature Of Prejudice By Gordon Allport

Each year, my extended family gathers for a huge Passover Seder in Naples, Florida. My seventy-six-year-old grandfather presides over the ritual meal, leading us through the prayers and songs of religious freedom. The family at the table includes believers, seekers, and secularists, Jews, Catholics, Protestants, Buddhists, and those who claim an interfaith identity. A Jewish cousin who is about to become a Bar Mitzvah and a Catholic cousin who just received First Communion compete against me, an interfaith child, to find the traditionally hidden matzo. Together, we are a joyous, motley crew, intent on celebrating together.
In twenty-first century America, I have discovered that I live in a kaleidoscope of religious identities: complex, swirling patterns of faith, spirituality, heritage, and practice. Many Americans attend more than one place of worship (Miller, 2013).

In his book titled The Nature of Prejudice, Allport wrote a chapter on the formation of in-groups. He writes, “As early as the age of five, a child is capable of understanding that he is a member of various groups. He is capable, for example, of a sense of ethnic identification. Until he is nine or ten he will not be able to understand just what his membership signifieshow, for example, Jews differ from gentiles or Quakers from Methodists, but he does not wait for this understanding before he develops fierce in-group loyalties (Allport, 1979). My experience, as a member of two religions, contradicts Allport’s findings. My parents forced me to join two in-groups a multitude of reasons. A major reason is that group membership often results in some form of need satisfaction on the part of the individual. My parents were not satisfied just belonging to one in-group, so they decided to remain part of