This focus on understanding the practical embodiment of a
religion and its discourses entails paying special attention to
the nature of power relationships within a religious community.
Adherents to the same religion often disagree about its
discourse and/or how to best embody it in concrete social
practices. Which discourse becomes the dominant one and
which practices are enforced are not power independent. For
example, the official ban on contraception in the Catholic
Church, with devastating consequences in HIV/AIDS affected
countries, illustrates the power element in interpreting religious
teaching: out of the 72 members of the Commission in
charge of drafting the position of the Church on contraception
in 1960, only nine interpreted Catholic teaching as requiring a
ban on artificial contraception (Keely, 1994).