40 results
14 - Astrobiology and theology
- from Part III - Philosophical, theological, and moral impact: How do we comprehend the cultural challenges raised by discovery?
-
- By Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University
- Edited by Steven J. Dick, Library of Congress, Washington DC
-
- Book:
- The Impact of Discovering Life beyond Earth
- Published online:
- 05 November 2015
- Print publication:
- 26 October 2015, pp 222-232
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
-
Summary
Astrobiology requires us to rethink what is “universal” and what is “particular.” The capacities and characteristics we have learned to regard as universally human – often after some effort to overcome the prejudices of our own race, culture, or class – may need to be viewed in a different light as we discover other possibilities for life in the universe. We may have to get used to thinking of the “universal” as particular to our own planet and species. This obviously applies to human biology, but it is equally true for our declarations about “universal human rights” and for philosophical ideas like “humans are political animals” or “all men are created equal.” These universals are deeply embedded in traditions of thought and social institutions, but they may take on a different meaning when viewed in relation to other possible forms of life and intelligence.
This challenge is especially interesting when we think about religious traditions, which already speak about human universals in a frame of reference that transcends time and space. Religion, like astrobiology, locates life in the universe. It gives humanity a place in relation to reality as a whole. Perhaps that is why theologians have long been interested in the possibility of life on other worlds (Crowe 1997). A theology that understands humanity in relation to God cannot but be interested in how other life might participate in such a relationship, too.
For the most part, of course, the problems of terrestrial life give people of faith and their religious leaders quite enough to worry about. Providing universal safety, security, and peace for the one form of intelligent life we know exceeds our present capacities, and debate continues about exactly what the needs of that life are, especially when we move beyond biological requirements to consider social and political relationships.
Thus, an important concern in recent theology has been to explore the moral implications of the human dignity that all persons share. We are not only made of the same stuff. We are “made in the image of God,” as some scriptural traditions put it. To be human makes us equal, and equal at a high rank that demands the kind of respect that modern politics formulates in terms of universal human rights (Waldron 2012).
The theological vision of Reinhold Niebuhr's ‘The irony of American history’. In the battle and above it. By Scott R. Erwin. (Oxford Theology and Religion Monographs.) Pp. vii+185. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. £50. 978 0 19 967837 2
- Robin W. Lovin
-
- Journal:
- The Journal of Ecclesiastical History / Volume 65 / Issue 4 / October 2014
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 11 September 2014, p. 955
- Print publication:
- October 2014
-
- Article
- Export citation
10 - Security and the state: a Christian realist perspective on the world since 9/11
- Edited by Esther D. Reed, University of Exeter, Michael Dumper, University of Exeter
-
- Book:
- Civil Liberties, National Security and Prospects for Consensus
- Published online:
- 05 March 2012
- Print publication:
- 01 March 2012, pp 241-256
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
Contributors
- Edited by Esther D. Reed, University of Exeter, Michael Dumper, University of Exeter
-
- Book:
- Civil Liberties, National Security and Prospects for Consensus
- Published online:
- 05 March 2012
- Print publication:
- 01 March 2012, pp vii-viii
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
Contributors
-
- By Rose Teteki Abbey, K. C. Abraham, David Tuesday Adamo, LeRoy H. Aden, Efrain Agosto, Victor Aguilan, Gillian T. W. Ahlgren, Charanjit Kaur AjitSingh, Dorothy B E A Akoto, Giuseppe Alberigo, Daniel E. Albrecht, Ruth Albrecht, Daniel O. Aleshire, Urs Altermatt, Anand Amaladass, Michael Amaladoss, James N. Amanze, Lesley G. Anderson, Thomas C. Anderson, Victor Anderson, Hope S. Antone, María Pilar Aquino, Paula Arai, Victorio Araya Guillén, S. Wesley Ariarajah, Ellen T. Armour, Brett Gregory Armstrong, Atsuhiro Asano, Naim Stifan Ateek, Mahmoud Ayoub, John Alembillah Azumah, Mercedes L. García Bachmann, Irena Backus, J. Wayne Baker, Mieke Bal, Lewis V. Baldwin, William Barbieri, António Barbosa da Silva, David Basinger, Bolaji Olukemi Bateye, Oswald Bayer, Daniel H. Bays, Rosalie Beck, Nancy Elizabeth Bedford, Guy-Thomas Bedouelle, Chorbishop Seely Beggiani, Wolfgang Behringer, Christopher M. Bellitto, Byard Bennett, Harold V. Bennett, Teresa Berger, Miguel A. Bernad, Henley Bernard, Alan E. Bernstein, Jon L. Berquist, Johannes Beutler, Ana María Bidegain, Matthew P. Binkewicz, Jennifer Bird, Joseph Blenkinsopp, Dmytro Bondarenko, Paulo Bonfatti, Riet en Pim Bons-Storm, Jessica A. Boon, Marcus J. Borg, Mark Bosco, Peter C. Bouteneff, François Bovon, William D. Bowman, Paul S. Boyer, David Brakke, Richard E. Brantley, Marcus Braybrooke, Ian Breward, Ênio José da Costa Brito, Jewel Spears Brooker, Johannes Brosseder, Nicholas Canfield Read Brown, Robert F. Brown, Pamela K. Brubaker, Walter Brueggemann, Bishop Colin O. Buchanan, Stanley M. Burgess, Amy Nelson Burnett, J. Patout Burns, David B. Burrell, David Buttrick, James P. Byrd, Lavinia Byrne, Gerado Caetano, Marcos Caldas, Alkiviadis Calivas, William J. Callahan, Salvatore Calomino, Euan K. Cameron, William S. Campbell, Marcelo Ayres Camurça, Daniel F. Caner, Paul E. Capetz, Carlos F. Cardoza-Orlandi, Patrick W. Carey, Barbara Carvill, Hal Cauthron, Subhadra Mitra Channa, Mark D. Chapman, James H. Charlesworth, Kenneth R. Chase, Chen Zemin, Luciano Chianeque, Philip Chia Phin Yin, Francisca H. Chimhanda, Daniel Chiquete, John T. Chirban, Soobin Choi, Robert Choquette, Mita Choudhury, Gerald Christianson, John Chryssavgis, Sejong Chun, Esther Chung-Kim, Charles M. A. Clark, Elizabeth A. Clark, Sathianathan Clarke, Fred Cloud, John B. Cobb, W. Owen Cole, John A Coleman, John J. Collins, Sylvia Collins-Mayo, Paul K. Conkin, Beth A. Conklin, Sean Connolly, Demetrios J. Constantelos, Michael A. Conway, Paula M. Cooey, Austin Cooper, Michael L. Cooper-White, Pamela Cooper-White, L. William Countryman, Sérgio Coutinho, Pamela Couture, Shannon Craigo-Snell, James L. Crenshaw, David Crowner, Humberto Horacio Cucchetti, Lawrence S. Cunningham, Elizabeth Mason Currier, Emmanuel Cutrone, Mary L. Daniel, David D. Daniels, Robert Darden, Rolf Darge, Isaiah Dau, Jeffry C. Davis, Jane Dawson, Valentin Dedji, John W. de Gruchy, Paul DeHart, Wendy J. Deichmann Edwards, Miguel A. De La Torre, George E. Demacopoulos, Thomas de Mayo, Leah DeVun, Beatriz de Vasconcellos Dias, Dennis C. Dickerson, John M. Dillon, Luis Miguel Donatello, Igor Dorfmann-Lazarev, Susanna Drake, Jonathan A. Draper, N. Dreher Martin, Otto Dreydoppel, Angelyn Dries, A. J. Droge, Francis X. D'Sa, Marilyn Dunn, Nicole Wilkinson Duran, Rifaat Ebied, Mark J. Edwards, William H. Edwards, Leonard H. Ehrlich, Nancy L. Eiesland, Martin Elbel, J. Harold Ellens, Stephen Ellingson, Marvin M. Ellison, Robert Ellsberg, Jean Bethke Elshtain, Eldon Jay Epp, Peter C. Erb, Tassilo Erhardt, Maria Erling, Noel Leo Erskine, Gillian R. Evans, Virginia Fabella, Michael A. Fahey, Edward Farley, Margaret A. Farley, Wendy Farley, Robert Fastiggi, Seena Fazel, Duncan S. Ferguson, Helwar Figueroa, Paul Corby Finney, Kyriaki Karidoyanes FitzGerald, Thomas E. FitzGerald, John R. Fitzmier, Marie Therese Flanagan, Sabina Flanagan, Claude Flipo, Ronald B. Flowers, Carole Fontaine, David Ford, Mary Ford, Stephanie A. Ford, Jim Forest, William Franke, Robert M. Franklin, Ruth Franzén, Edward H. Friedman, Samuel Frouisou, Lorelei F. Fuchs, Jojo M. Fung, Inger Furseth, Richard R. Gaillardetz, Brandon Gallaher, China Galland, Mark Galli, Ismael García, Tharscisse Gatwa, Jean-Marie Gaudeul, Luis María Gavilanes del Castillo, Pavel L. Gavrilyuk, Volney P. Gay, Metropolitan Athanasios Geevargis, Kondothra M. George, Mary Gerhart, Simon Gikandi, Maurice Gilbert, Michael J. Gillgannon, Verónica Giménez Beliveau, Terryl Givens, Beth Glazier-McDonald, Philip Gleason, Menghun Goh, Brian Golding, Bishop Hilario M. Gomez, Michelle A. Gonzalez, Donald K. Gorrell, Roy Gottfried, Tamara Grdzelidze, Joel B. Green, Niels Henrik Gregersen, Cristina Grenholm, Herbert Griffiths, Eric W. Gritsch, Erich S. Gruen, Christoffer H. Grundmann, Paul H. Gundani, Jon P. Gunnemann, Petre Guran, Vidar L. Haanes, Jeremiah M. Hackett, Getatchew Haile, Douglas John Hall, Nicholas Hammond, Daphne Hampson, Jehu J. Hanciles, Barry Hankins, Jennifer Haraguchi, Stanley S. Harakas, Anthony John Harding, Conrad L. Harkins, J. William Harmless, Marjory Harper, Amir Harrak, Joel F. Harrington, Mark W. Harris, Susan Ashbrook Harvey, Van A. Harvey, R. Chris Hassel, Jione Havea, Daniel Hawk, Diana L. Hayes, Leslie Hayes, Priscilla Hayner, S. Mark Heim, Simo Heininen, Richard P. Heitzenrater, Eila Helander, David Hempton, Scott H. Hendrix, Jan-Olav Henriksen, Gina Hens-Piazza, Carter Heyward, Nicholas J. Higham, David Hilliard, Norman A. Hjelm, Peter C. Hodgson, Arthur Holder, M. Jan Holton, Dwight N. Hopkins, Ronnie Po-chia Hsia, Po-Ho Huang, James Hudnut-Beumler, Jennifer S. Hughes, Leonard M. Hummel, Mary E. Hunt, Laennec Hurbon, Mark Hutchinson, Susan E. Hylen, Mary Beth Ingham, H. Larry Ingle, Dale T. Irvin, Jon Isaak, Paul John Isaak, Ada María Isasi-Díaz, Hans Raun Iversen, Margaret C. Jacob, Arthur James, Maria Jansdotter-Samuelsson, David Jasper, Werner G. Jeanrond, Renée Jeffery, David Lyle Jeffrey, Theodore W. Jennings, David H. Jensen, Robin Margaret Jensen, David Jobling, Dale A. Johnson, Elizabeth A. Johnson, Maxwell E. Johnson, Sarah Johnson, Mark D. Johnston, F. Stanley Jones, James William Jones, John R. Jones, Alissa Jones Nelson, Inge Jonsson, Jan Joosten, Elizabeth Judd, Mulambya Peggy Kabonde, Robert Kaggwa, Sylvester Kahakwa, Isaac Kalimi, Ogbu U. Kalu, Eunice Kamaara, Wayne C. Kannaday, Musimbi Kanyoro, Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen, Frank Kaufmann, Léon Nguapitshi Kayongo, Richard Kearney, Alice A. Keefe, Ralph Keen, Catherine Keller, Anthony J. Kelly, Karen Kennelly, Kathi Lynn Kern, Fergus Kerr, Edward Kessler, George Kilcourse, Heup Young Kim, Kim Sung-Hae, Kim Yong-Bock, Kim Yung Suk, Richard King, Thomas M. King, Robert M. Kingdon, Ross Kinsler, Hans G. Kippenberg, Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan, Clifton Kirkpatrick, Leonid Kishkovsky, Nadieszda Kizenko, Jeffrey Klaiber, Hans-Josef Klauck, Sidney Knight, Samuel Kobia, Robert Kolb, Karla Ann Koll, Heikki Kotila, Donald Kraybill, Philip D. W. Krey, Yves Krumenacker, Jeffrey Kah-Jin Kuan, Simanga R. Kumalo, Peter Kuzmic, Simon Shui-Man Kwan, Kwok Pui-lan, André LaCocque, Stephen E. Lahey, John Tsz Pang Lai, Emiel Lamberts, Armando Lampe, Craig Lampe, Beverly J. Lanzetta, Eve LaPlante, Lizette Larson-Miller, Ariel Bybee Laughton, Leonard Lawlor, Bentley Layton, Robin A. Leaver, Karen Lebacqz, Archie Chi Chung Lee, Marilyn J. Legge, Hervé LeGrand, D. L. LeMahieu, Raymond Lemieux, Bill J. Leonard, Ellen M. Leonard, Outi Leppä, Jean Lesaulnier, Nantawan Boonprasat Lewis, Henrietta Leyser, Alexei Lidov, Bernard Lightman, Paul Chang-Ha Lim, Carter Lindberg, Mark R. Lindsay, James R. Linville, James C. Livingston, Ann Loades, David Loades, Jean-Claude Loba-Mkole, Lo Lung Kwong, Wati Longchar, Eleazar López, David W. Lotz, Andrew Louth, Robin W. Lovin, William Luis, Frank D. Macchia, Diarmaid N. J. MacCulloch, Kirk R. MacGregor, Marjory A. MacLean, Donald MacLeod, Tomas S. Maddela, Inge Mager, Laurenti Magesa, David G. Maillu, Fortunato Mallimaci, Philip Mamalakis, Kä Mana, Ukachukwu Chris Manus, Herbert Robinson Marbury, Reuel Norman Marigza, Jacqueline Mariña, Antti Marjanen, Luiz C. L. Marques, Madipoane Masenya (ngwan'a Mphahlele), Caleb J. D. Maskell, Steve Mason, Thomas Massaro, Fernando Matamoros Ponce, András Máté-Tóth, Odair Pedroso Mateus, Dinis Matsolo, Fumitaka Matsuoka, John D'Arcy May, Yelena Mazour-Matusevich, Theodore Mbazumutima, John S. McClure, Christian McConnell, Lee Martin McDonald, Gary B. McGee, Thomas McGowan, Alister E. McGrath, Richard J. McGregor, John A. McGuckin, Maud Burnett McInerney, Elsie Anne McKee, Mary B. McKinley, James F. McMillan, Ernan McMullin, Kathleen E. McVey, M. Douglas Meeks, Monica Jyotsna Melanchthon, Ilie Melniciuc-Puica, Everett Mendoza, Raymond A. Mentzer, William W. Menzies, Ina Merdjanova, Franziska Metzger, Constant J. Mews, Marvin Meyer, Carol Meyers, Vasile Mihoc, Gunner Bjerg Mikkelsen, Maria Inêz de Castro Millen, Clyde Lee Miller, Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore, Alexander Mirkovic, Paul Misner, Nozomu Miyahira, R. W. L. Moberly, Gerald Moede, Aloo Osotsi Mojola, Sunanda Mongia, Rebeca Montemayor, James Moore, Roger E. Moore, Craig E. Morrison O.Carm, Jeffry H. Morrison, Keith Morrison, Wilson J. Moses, Tefetso Henry Mothibe, Mokgethi Motlhabi, Fulata Moyo, Henry Mugabe, Jesse Ndwiga Kanyua Mugambi, Peggy Mulambya-Kabonde, Robert Bruce Mullin, Pamela Mullins Reaves, Saskia Murk Jansen, Heleen L. Murre-Van den Berg, Augustine Musopole, Isaac M. T. Mwase, Philomena Mwaura, Cecilia Nahnfeldt, Anne Nasimiyu Wasike, Carmiña Navia Velasco, Thulani Ndlazi, Alexander Negrov, James B. Nelson, David G. Newcombe, Carol Newsom, Helen J. Nicholson, George W. E. Nickelsburg, Tatyana Nikolskaya, Damayanthi M. A. Niles, Bertil Nilsson, Nyambura Njoroge, Fidelis Nkomazana, Mary Beth Norton, Christian Nottmeier, Sonene Nyawo, Anthère Nzabatsinda, Edward T. Oakes, Gerald O'Collins, Daniel O'Connell, David W. Odell-Scott, Mercy Amba Oduyoye, Kathleen O'Grady, Oyeronke Olajubu, Thomas O'Loughlin, Dennis T. Olson, J. Steven O'Malley, Cephas N. Omenyo, Muriel Orevillo-Montenegro, César Augusto Ornellas Ramos, Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator, Kenan B. Osborne, Carolyn Osiek, Javier Otaola Montagne, Douglas F. Ottati, Anna May Say Pa, Irina Paert, Jerry G. Pankhurst, Aristotle Papanikolaou, Samuele F. Pardini, Stefano Parenti, Peter Paris, Sung Bae Park, Cristián G. Parker, Raquel Pastor, Joseph Pathrapankal, Daniel Patte, W. Brown Patterson, Clive Pearson, Keith F. Pecklers, Nancy Cardoso Pereira, David Horace Perkins, Pheme Perkins, Edward N. Peters, Rebecca Todd Peters, Bishop Yeznik Petrossian, Raymond Pfister, Peter C. Phan, Isabel Apawo Phiri, William S. F. Pickering, Derrick G. Pitard, William Elvis Plata, Zlatko Plese, John Plummer, James Newton Poling, Ronald Popivchak, Andrew Porter, Ute Possekel, James M. Powell, Enos Das Pradhan, Devadasan Premnath, Jaime Adrían Prieto Valladares, Anne Primavesi, Randall Prior, María Alicia Puente Lutteroth, Eduardo Guzmão Quadros, Albert Rabil, Laurent William Ramambason, Apolonio M. Ranche, Vololona Randriamanantena Andriamitandrina, Lawrence R. Rast, Paul L. Redditt, Adele Reinhartz, Rolf Rendtorff, Pål Repstad, James N. Rhodes, John K. Riches, Joerg Rieger, Sharon H. Ringe, Sandra Rios, Tyler Roberts, David M. Robinson, James M. Robinson, Joanne Maguire Robinson, Richard A. H. Robinson, Roy R. Robson, Jack B. Rogers, Maria Roginska, Sidney Rooy, Rev. Garnett Roper, Maria José Fontelas Rosado-Nunes, Andrew C. Ross, Stefan Rossbach, François Rossier, John D. Roth, John K. Roth, Phillip Rothwell, Richard E. Rubenstein, Rosemary Radford Ruether, Markku Ruotsila, John E. Rybolt, Risto Saarinen, John Saillant, Juan Sanchez, Wagner Lopes Sanchez, Hugo N. Santos, Gerhard Sauter, Gloria L. Schaab, Sandra M. Schneiders, Quentin J. Schultze, Fernando F. Segovia, Turid Karlsen Seim, Carsten Selch Jensen, Alan P. F. Sell, Frank C. Senn, Kent Davis Sensenig, Damían Setton, Bal Krishna Sharma, Carolyn J. Sharp, Thomas Sheehan, N. Gerald Shenk, Christian Sheppard, Charles Sherlock, Tabona Shoko, Walter B. Shurden, Marguerite Shuster, B. Mark Sietsema, Batara Sihombing, Neil Silberman, Clodomiro Siller, Samuel Silva-Gotay, Heikki Silvet, John K. Simmons, Hagith Sivan, James C. Skedros, Abraham Smith, Ashley A. Smith, Ted A. Smith, Daud Soesilo, Pia Søltoft, Choan-Seng (C. S.) Song, Kathryn Spink, Bryan Spinks, Eric O. Springsted, Nicolas Standaert, Brian Stanley, Glen H. Stassen, Karel Steenbrink, Stephen J. Stein, Andrea Sterk, Gregory E. Sterling, Columba Stewart, Jacques Stewart, Robert B. Stewart, Cynthia Stokes Brown, Ken Stone, Anne Stott, Elizabeth Stuart, Monya Stubbs, Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki, David Kwang-sun Suh, Scott W. Sunquist, Keith Suter, Douglas Sweeney, Charles H. Talbert, Shawqi N. Talia, Elsa Tamez, Joseph B. Tamney, Jonathan Y. Tan, Yak-Hwee Tan, Kathryn Tanner, Feiya Tao, Elizabeth S. Tapia, Aquiline Tarimo, Claire Taylor, Mark Lewis Taylor, Bishop Abba Samuel Wolde Tekestebirhan, Eugene TeSelle, M. Thomas Thangaraj, David R. Thomas, Andrew Thornley, Scott Thumma, Marcelo Timotheo da Costa, George E. “Tink” Tinker, Ola Tjørhom, Karen Jo Torjesen, Iain R. Torrance, Fernando Torres-Londoño, Archbishop Demetrios [Trakatellis], Marit Trelstad, Christine Trevett, Phyllis Trible, Johannes Tromp, Paul Turner, Robert G. Tuttle, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Peter Tyler, Anders Tyrberg, Justin Ukpong, Javier Ulloa, Camillus Umoh, Kristi Upson-Saia, Martina Urban, Monica Uribe, Elochukwu Eugene Uzukwu, Richard Vaggione, Gabriel Vahanian, Paul Valliere, T. J. Van Bavel, Steven Vanderputten, Peter Van der Veer, Huub Van de Sandt, Louis Van Tongeren, Luke A. Veronis, Noel Villalba, Ramón Vinke, Tim Vivian, David Voas, Elena Volkova, Katharina von Kellenbach, Elina Vuola, Timothy Wadkins, Elaine M. Wainwright, Randi Jones Walker, Dewey D. Wallace, Jerry Walls, Michael J. Walsh, Philip Walters, Janet Walton, Jonathan L. Walton, Wang Xiaochao, Patricia A. Ward, David Harrington Watt, Herold D. Weiss, Laurence L. Welborn, Sharon D. Welch, Timothy Wengert, Traci C. West, Merold Westphal, David Wetherell, Barbara Wheeler, Carolinne White, Jean-Paul Wiest, Frans Wijsen, Terry L. Wilder, Felix Wilfred, Rebecca Wilkin, Daniel H. Williams, D. Newell Williams, Michael A. Williams, Vincent L. Wimbush, Gabriele Winkler, Anders Winroth, Lauri Emílio Wirth, James A. Wiseman, Ebba Witt-Brattström, Teofil Wojciechowski, John Wolffe, Kenman L. Wong, Wong Wai Ching, Linda Woodhead, Wendy M. Wright, Rose Wu, Keith E. Yandell, Gale A. Yee, Viktor Yelensky, Yeo Khiok-Khng, Gustav K. K. Yeung, Angela Yiu, Amos Yong, Yong Ting Jin, You Bin, Youhanna Nessim Youssef, Eliana Yunes, Robert Michael Zaller, Valarie H. Ziegler, Barbara Brown Zikmund, Joyce Ann Zimmerman, Aurora Zlotnik, Zhuo Xinping
- Edited by Daniel Patte, Vanderbilt University, Tennessee
-
- Book:
- The Cambridge Dictionary of Christianity
- Published online:
- 05 August 2012
- Print publication:
- 20 September 2010, pp xi-xliv
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
Community of Character - Stanley Hauerwas: A Community of Character: Toward a Constructive Christian Social Ethic. (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1981. Pp. 298. $20.00.)
- Robin W. Lovin
-
- Journal:
- The Review of Politics / Volume 44 / Issue 4 / October 1982
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 05 August 2009, pp. 622-624
-
- Article
- Export citation
Lovin on Trigg, Religion in Public Life1
- Robin W. Lovin
-
- Journal:
- Scottish Journal of Theology / Volume 62 / Issue 2 / May 2009
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 May 2009, pp. 175-184
- Print publication:
- May 2009
-
- Article
- Export citation
-
The relationship between religion and public life is a universal problem, but discussions of it quickly become very local. They begin with the global reality of religious diversity, then the analysis descends into the particulars of the legal and constitutional system immediately in view, assuming always the sociological features of religious diversity most familiar to the audience at hand. French analysts typically take laïcité as the standard for modern solutions to the problem, while they view with alarm the cultural gap which separates older French citizens from recent Muslim immigrants. American writers, by contrast, usually have a more benign view of cultural diversity, which has grown up over generations of immigration. They turn quickly to the ambiguities of church–state law which govern religious expression in public space. Roger Trigg provides a thoughtful alternative to these parochial analyses. His Religion in Public Life explores a variety of national settings and he formulates his questions in terms which avoid legal or religious assumptions that are already in place where the question is asked. At the same time, he makes no premature claims to rational universality or global solutions. Religion in Public Life is primarily an investigation of European and North American contexts, or in other places which share a British legal and cultural heritage. In these places, religion and public life are shaped by the realities of modern law and the modern state and appeals to reason still mean something, even if they cannot mean quite as much as liberal theorists thought they meant only a few decades ago. But even among these nations, linked by culture, commerce and commitment to democracy, there is a surprising range of legal arrangements relating to religious expression and religious institutions and there are considerable differences in the social facts behind the legal differences. This, Trigg suggests, is a large enough world to allow us to discuss real differences without succumbing to the confusion which sometimes results from too much information. It is also a world in which we are acutely aware that public life has problems in need of solutions. Instead of hurrying to keep religion out of sight or under control, we are perhaps more willing to see what it has to contribute.
Select Bibliography
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp 223-228
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
Frontmatter
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp i-iv
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
Introduction
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp 1-18
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
-
Summary
Christian realism is a reminder of our limits and an affirmation of our hope. It tells us that our knowledge is imperfect, our plans are incomplete, and our expectations are inevitably distorted by self-interest. We are always trying to overcome these limitations, and we are often partly successful; but our partial successes make it all the more important to remember that the limits remain, mocking our confidence with ironic reversals and threatening our pride with forces beyond our control. Final answers and permanent solutions elude us.
Nevertheless, we live in a meaningful universe. Conflict, violence, and the relentless background drone of anxiety are not the ultimate reality. The coherence of our partial truths and the justice that expresses our imperfect love point to reality in a way that incoherence and injustice do not. So we feel ourselves always obliged to work toward a better approximation of justice and peace, and we cannot rest content merely in prevailing with our own interests.
Everyone experiences this dialectic of power and finitude, meaning and incoherence, hope and anxiety. For some, it signals a need to dig through the distortions of human subjectivity to the hard core of objective fact. For others, the persistence of incoherence and violence suggests that objectivity itself is an illusion, and the only order we will find is the one we make for ourselves.
For biblical faith, however, this unresolved tension in all human experience reveals the nature of ultimate reality and locates our place within it.
Index
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp 229-231
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
6 - Human Goods and Human Dignity
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp 181-222
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
-
Summary
THE IRONY OF MODERN POLITICS
Tracing the interactions between the contexts that provide human goods gives us a more complex and realistic picture of how the modern world creates social order, and unapologetic politics gives us a more complete account of public discourse. No single set of rules governs this discourse or regulates the relationships between competing contexts. The successful modern state has less need of shared ideas and a greater tolerance for conflict than the theologians and philosophers who envisioned modern politics at first thought.
This success, however, creates its own need for a unity that may not be supplied by political activity, even with the expanded scope that politics has in the unapologetic model. The contexts that make up a society are brought into a working relationship through politics. For our lives, it is a different matter. As we are led deeper into family, culture, government, work, and religion, our responsibilities seem more and more to conflict and compete. We acquire the knowledge and skills that make us effective at our work, good citizens, and responsible family members. More and more, we know how to shape the contexts where we live and work, at least on a local level. Colleagues and neighbors look to us for leadership. We know that many of them – our children, our students, the teams we lead, and the people we supervise – depend on us.
2 - A Short History of Christian Realism
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp 43-83
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
-
Summary
REALITY AND RESPONSIBILITY
The Christian realisms that we explored in the previous chapter call for further exploration of their history. The increasing complexity of global relationships and the sharp differences that separate our world from the world that Reinhold Niebuhr knew make different understandings of Christian realism inevitable, but the lines along which these interpretations divide reflect older and deeper controversies in Christian theology and ethics.
Christians have always lived in the tension between ultimate reality and immediate responsibility. From the beginning, they have expected God's ultimate victory over all conditions that threaten the meaning of life and deprive human action of purpose. Christians measure choice and action by this hope, and not by the chances of success or failure. Thus, theologians as different as Stanley Hauerwas and Reinhold Niebuhr have affirmed that doing Christian ethics requires thinking eschatologically. This accounts for the persistence of apocalyptic movements and ideas in lived Christian faith, even in a secular, scientific age. It also helps to explain why today's Counterapocalyptic Realists are so urgent in rejecting a political apocalypse that puts the recreation of the world in the hands of the powerful. To do that destroys the distinctive hope that Christian eschatology has always offered to the poor.
Christian hope, however, is not only eschatological. The world which God will finally rule is also God's creation, which means that it is from the beginning ordered toward that end.
3 - Contexts of Responsibility
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp 84-116
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
-
Summary
POLITICS AND “VALUES”
Modern politics, as we have seen, begins with a sphere of secular authority whose concerns are distinct from the search for religious truth and moral virtue. For those who accepted this modern politics, it seemed axiomatic that increased diversity would require a progressively more rigorous distinction between the goals of politics and the human good. Under what John Rawls called “conditions of reasonable pluralism,” public political discussions cannot be directed toward agreement on the good. The possibilities of agreement are too remote, and there are many urgent questions that need to be answered first. Disagreements between reasonable people about the human good are a fact around which politics must be structured, not a problem that modern politics can resolve.
Nevertheless, it seems that one result of the growing diversity in contemporary society is an unanticipated public interest in “values.” The more people see that their neighbors shape their lives in unfamiliar ways and follow different religious and cultural traditions, the more they want to know exactly what these neighbors think a good life would be. How do they think about their families? How do they see work in relation to the rest of their lives? What role does religion play in their choices?
When new immigrants flow into a community, the old residents and the new alike become amateur anthropologists, trying to understand the world as others see it in relation to the world of their own experience.
5 - A Global Order
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp 152-180
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
-
Summary
QUESTIONS
Reinhold Niebuhr and Dietrich Bonhoeffer saw the problem of political order in global terms. No doubt this was partly the result of personal experience, for both of them traveled widely for young men of their day, and both came to maturity in a society that was having its expectations reshaped by the shock of global war and worldwide economic depression. Personal experience was reinforced for both men by participation in Protestant ecumenism, which before, during, and after the Second World War sought to make a united witness to the theological conditions for lasting world peace. Bonhoeffer, in the secrecy of a resistance group, thought about what the world might be like after the war. Niebuhr and the political realists whom he influenced lived to help shape it.
A decade after the end of the Second World War, Niebuhr thought that the world was still in the beginning stages of global integration. Order on a global scale was needed to repair the disorder left after two world wars, organize the rapid growth of postwar trade and communication, and control the new threat posed by nuclear weapons. The necessary institutions and practices, however, were only slowly taking shape in the United Nations and regional security organizations, such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
One problem, as Niebuhr saw it, was that democracy, which provided the best reconciliation of freedom with the requirements of community, had arrived at its solution to this problem gradually, over time and by experiment.
1 - Reflections on the End of an Era
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp 19-42
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
-
Summary
THE CRISIS
At the end of 1933, the future looked grim for the social and political order that had dominated the world at the end of the nineteenth century. Europe had destroyed a generation of its youth in a disastrous war and disrupted the world economy, and the effects were still being felt more than a decade later. The only signs of recovery seemed to be in Russia, Germany, and Japan, places that had abandoned democracy and capitalism for a communist or nationalist vision that would be spread by revolution or by conquest.
In light of those political and historical realities, Reinhold Niebuhr abandoned the sentimental hope of the Social Gospel that Christian ideals would change social realities for the better. Realism required a harder look at the pervasive self-interest of the rich and the need for power of the poor. Like early Christian apocalyptic or Marxist revolutionary theory, Christian realism also seemed to require a recognition that civilization had arrived at the end of an age. The foundations of social life had been so disrupted that conventional wisdom and established expectations could no longer guide responsible action.
This theme distressed many of Niebuhr's Christian readers, who still wanted to see the Gospel as a strategy for social transformation, but Niebuhr repeated the point even more forcefully a little more than a year later in Reflections on the End of an Era.
Contents
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp v-vi
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
Preface
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp vii-viii
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
-
Summary
More than a decade ago, I wrote a book called Reinhold Niebuhr and Christian Realism. The distinction between the man and the method was important to me, as it was to Niebuhr himself. Christian realism did not belong to him alone, though he was its most articulate and influential voice. It is a way of thinking deeply embedded in Christian tradition, and it can be systematically distinguished from other ways of thinking about politics, ethics, and theology available in Niebuhr's time and in ours.
This volume continues that effort to take the way of thinking that Niebuhr represented beyond his own formulation of it. This is not because I think less of Niebuhr, but precisely because I think his Christian realism has been intellectually isolated by more recent developments in philosophy and theology that make it harder for contemporary scholars to appreciate his insights. I have tried to address these problems here by emphasizing the social and political pluralism in the Christian realist tradition and by stressing the theology of responsibility on which his pragmatic approach to moral problems depends. The idea of responsible action connects Niebuhr more closely than I had understood before to his theological adversary, Karl Barth, and to his erstwhile student, Dietrich Bonhoeffer. This book is in some respects an effort to write the theology and ethics we might have had if Niebuhr and Bonhoeffer had each had the opportunity to actually understand what the other was saying.
Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Robin W. Lovin
-
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008
-
Are religion and public life really separate spheres of human activity? Should they be? In this book, Robin W. Lovin criticizes contemporary political and theological views that separate religion from public life as though these areas were systematically opposed and makes the case for a more integrated understanding of modern society. Such an understanding can be underpinned by 'Christian realism', which encourages responsible engagement with social and political problems from a distinctive perspective. Drawing on the work of Rawls, Galston, Niebuhr, and Bonhoeffer, Lovin argues that the responsibilities of everyday life are a form of politics. Political commitment is no longer confined to the sphere of law and government, and a global ethics arises from the decisions of individuals. This book will foster a better understanding of contemporary political thought among theologians and will introduce readers primarily interested in political thought to relevant developments in recent theology.
4 - Unapologetic Politics
- Robin W. Lovin, Southern Methodist University, Texas
-
- Book:
- Christian Realism and the New Realities
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 14 April 2008, pp 117-151
-
- Chapter
- Export citation
-
Summary
CHRISTIANITY AND DEMOCRACY
In previous chapters, we explored the history of Christian realism and ways of thinking about a society made up of differentiated contexts in which people create and maintain goods important for human living. Whether in Protestant language of “orders,” “spheres,” and “mandates,” or in Catholic social teaching regarding “subsidiary” institutions, Christian theology has called attention to the concrete, local responsibilities that bind people to their neighbors in these contexts. Participation in contexts sets the terms in which much of the moral life is lived, and sustaining the more general social and political conditions under which all of the contexts of human life can flourish is an important standard by which the governments of modern states are judged.
Concern for these contexts and the human goods they provide brought Christianity and liberal democracy into close connection during the twentieth century. Against promises of new orders in which human life would be remade and human goods redefined, both Christianity and democracy rediscovered the value of goods already available in the institutions of work, family, faith, and culture, and they renewed the collaboration of religion and politics to sustain those goods and the pluralistic society that created them.
This collaboration did not make Christian realists into uncritical apologists for democracy, but it did make them important political allies and conversation partners in developing the intellectual framework for the renewed democracies which would emerge from this time of crisis.