Religion and finance

Assumptions about the separation of the domains of religion and finance – which are themselves the result of contingent historical and cultural developments – can obscure the deep and complex ways in which religion shapes and is shaped by the cultural life of money and finance. The many linguistic and symbolic crossings-over between religion and finance (for example in the language around debt and forgiveness, sovereignty and trust, gift and reward) indicate the ongoing ‘exchanges’ between these spheres of activity.   

What new critical questions arise for and within religious traditions as financial systems and practices develop in the twenty-first century? What happens when we read contemporary questions about finance in the context of the religious history of finance and the financial history of religion?