R. Scott Hanson wrote his doctoral dissertation at the University of Chicago on "City of Gods: Religious Freedom, Immigration, and Pluralism in Flushing, New York." He is a postdoctoral research associate at Brown University.
Flushing,
Queens is the most religiously and ethnically diverse community in America, with
a story that mirrors the nation in microcosm. Flushing's town charter of 1645 was the first in colonial America to grant religious freedom. When the provision for "liberty of conscience" was jeopardized by an intolerant governor bent on persecuting anyone who was not a member of the Dutch Reformed Church, the people of Flushing came together to defend the religious minorities in their town. In 1657, they drafted the Flushing Remonstrance, declaring that "we are bound by the law of God and man to do good unto all men, and evil to no man; and this is according to the Patent and Charter of our Town given unto us in the name of the States General which we are not willing to infringe and violate ... " Their efforts proved futile, however, and it was not until 1663, when John Bowne was banished from Flushing for holding Quaker meetings in his house and then successfully appealed his case, that the town and the rest of the colony would more fully enjoy this liberty.
Today
in Flushing there are ten different places of worship just on Bowne Street, named
for the Quaker who defended the town charter. Hindu and Buddhist temples, Sikh
gurdwaras, Muslim mosques, and Korean and Chinese churches stand next to older
churches that go back to the late 17th century and alongside Reform, Conservative,
and Orthodox Jewish synagogues. Services in Catholic churches are conducted in
English, Spanish, and Chinese. Protestant churches of every denomination abound,
including over 100 Korean (mainly Presbyterian) churches alone. All of these different
places of worship and the people who attend them are densely concentrated in a
small residential and commercial area encompassing just a few square miles. After a certain point, though, it does not seem to make much difference if there are 15 or 150 different places of worship next door to each other. Flushing is interesting because it is such an extreme case and because of its place in the history of religious freedom in America, but how do people make sense of such religious diversity? How does it affect their lives, attitudes, and beliefs, if at all? What do they do with it, and what does it do to them? How have the different religious and ethnic groups in Flushing associated across boundaries over time? Where does conflict or cooperation arise?
There
is quite a range of reactions. Some view the memory of Flushing's heritage as
a special blessing and are committed to the ideal of tolerance and the practice
of interreligious dialogue; others have forgotten it or are simply unaware of
it and see diversity only as a curse to feed their fear of change. Aside from
Christians and Jews in Flushing, the numerous immigrant religious groups also
have their own thoughts about the other faiths around them. There are a variety
of responses to the religious plurality in Flushing, depending on who is asked.
Forty years ago, Catholic theologian John Courtney Murray asked a question that seems particularly relevant for Flushing: "How much pluralism and what kinds of pluralism can a pluralist society stand?" The extreme case of Flushing suggests that there is no limit. Indeed, the great importance of this community may be its example to the rest of the country and the world -- an update of sorts on John Winthrop's notion of "a city that is set upon a hill" and what church historian Sidney E. Mead called the "lively experiment."
Flushing
needs to be reconsidered as part of the history of religious freedom and toleration
in America. It is safe to say that most Americans' knowledge of religious freedom
probably begins with Thomas Jefferson's Virginia Statute and ends with the First
Amendment. Those two acts certainly have national significance and practical meaning,
but Flushing's colonial history provides an important local context to examine
the same principles on a much smaller level, in addition to a necessary historical
corrective to earlier surveys of American history. What will it mean to live with pluralism in contemporary society? Flushing is still overwhelmingly Christian and, to a lesser extent, Jewish, just like the rest of the country. But it is also confronting profound changes with the introduction of other world religions and cultures. Although there have been moments of real tension and minor conflict -- over the years, there have been zoning, parking, and signage (in Chinese and Korean) complaints; newspapers have reported instances of vandalism (graffiti, eggs, destruction of lights); several attacks on new immigrants in the area, all by a white, black, and Hispanic mix of neighborhood teenagers and gang members --
Flushing
hasn't experienced the same kinds of problems that have torn apart other places
in the world. One reason is that historical and religious claims to territory
are not as strong here as they are internationally. Another is our voluntary principle
of religious disestablishment, the wisdom of the Constitution, a police precinct
with a community affairs office that strives to relate to and protect the area,
and the kind of vigilant "eyes on the street" that Jane Jacobs said often can
be found among residents in good city neighborhoods. But diversity also seems
to create tolerance over time, and the more diverse a place gets, the more tolerant
it seems to become. Some or many longtime residents may move away, and those who
stay may grumble about the changes and yearn for "the good old days," but over
time, a new equilibrium is reached. By contrast, conflict arises when a new group
moves into a place that has been homogenous for a long time. 
