Richard Rorty never cared much for religion, to say the least. Faithful to his own philosophical and political outlook, he did, however, abandon atheism in favor of anticlericalism—the view that religion should play no role in the public life of democratic societies.1 This shift sets him apart from advocates of New Atheism (and their opponents), who consider the arguments for atheism a crucial component in the overall case against religion,2 but also from the growing group of religious and nonreligious intellectuals (...) who argue that democratic societies need more, not less, religious contributions to public life.3Rorty also came to articulate—particularly in the last volume of his Collected Papers—his .. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This article brings Cormac McCarthy's novels into discussion with Dewey's thinking, particularly with an eye to the distinction, made famous from A Common Faith, between religion and “the religious.” In this work Dewey argues for emancipating what is genuinely religious from all that is adventitious to it—above all, anything wedded to ideas of the supernatural—so that “the religious aspect of experience will be free to develop freely on its own account.” He concludes by highlighting the need to make explicit (...) and militant “the common faith of mankind”—which lies in the recognition that “the things in civilization we most prize are not of ourselves” but “exist by grace of the doings and sufferings of the continuous human community in which we are a link.” While McCarthy's novels share Dewey's broadly anti-supernatural and anti-ecclesiastical commitments, there are some areas of divergence between the two that allow us to reflect critically on the distinction between religion and “the religious.” Most significantly, whereas Dewey aims to discern the intrinsic quality of the religious apart from what is adventitious to it, McCarthy focuses on the historical givenness of religious practices so as then to imagine their repurposing and radical transformation. (shrink)

What is the cash value of Richard Rorty’s philosophy and politics of religion? This paper analyzes the political promise of Rorty’s shift from atheism to anticlericalism in the last decade of his life. It seeks to deliver primarily a concise summary of this shift, and of its transformative motivation. Then a critique of this shift is followed by the suggestion of a friendly amendment: its extension towards a pragmatic pluralism. The outlined Rortyan conception of a serene, and, at the same (...) time robust, politics of religion is proposed as a promising answer to the question of how secular liberal citizens should react to the “return of the gods.”. (shrink)

This contribution seeks a nuanced democratic view on the position of religious and ideologically inspired views and argumentations on the political forum. We reject the liberal standard vision that rules out every reference to comprehensive doctrines. Political decisions should be neutral in their formulation of a proposition, but this does not exclude that there is some room for pluralism in the debate that precedes those decisions. From a democratic point of view there is no objection to religious and ideological views (...) and argumentations in the political debate on condition that citizens adopt a democratic attitude with regard to their own comprehensive views. (shrink)

This contribution seeks a nuanced democratic view on the position of religious and ideologically inspired views and argumentations on the political forum. We reject the liberal standard vision that rules out every reference to comprehensive doctrines. Political decisions should be neutral in their formulation of a proposition, but this does not exclude that there is some room for pluralism in the debate that precedes those decisions. From a democratic point of view there is no objection to religious and ideological views (...) and argumentations in the political debate on condition that citizens adopt a democratic attitude with regard to their own comprehensive views. (shrink)

This article offers a review of Richard Rorty’s attempts to come to terms with the role of religion in our public and intellectual life by tracing the key developments in his position, partially in response to the ubiquitous criticisms of his distinction between private and public projects. Since Rorty rejects the possibility of dismissing religion on purely epistemic grounds, he is determined to treat it, instead, as a matter of politics. My suggestion is that, in this respect, Rorty’s position is (...) best construed as that of a humanist rather than a post-modernist. Ultimately, it appears that, in his view, the positive element of religion—i.e. the idea of religion as a social gospel—has been absorbed and transformed into a utopian striving which humanists associate with the ideal of democracy. Hence, in this regard, religion can be considered obsolete. Yet, without explicitly invoking the usual epistemic grounds, Rorty’s arguments for excluding religion from the public sphere remain rather thin, and an interest in reforming rather than excluding religion would have been more consistent with his general outlook. (shrink)

This paper examines a remarkable document that has escaped critical attention within the vast literature on John Rawls, religion, and liberalism: Rawls's undergraduate thesis, "A Brief Inquiry into the Meaning of Sin and Faith: An Interpretation Based on the Concept of Community" (1942). The thesis shows the extent to which a once regnant version of Protestant theology has retreated into seminaries and divinity schools where it now also meets resistance. Ironically, the young Rawls rejected social contract liberalism for reasons that (...) anticipate many of the claims later made against him by secular and religious critics. The thesis and Rawls's late unpublished remarks on religion and World War II offer a new dimension to his intellectual biography. They show the significance of his humanist response to the moral impossibility of political theology. Moreover, they also reveal a kind of Rawlsian piety marginalized by contemporary debates over religion and liberalism. (shrink)

This article explores the question of the role of religion in the public square through the lens of Richard Rorty’s more general public–private distinction. When we note his various positions over the years on the role of religion in the public square we observe a shift that yields a more favorable public role for religion so long as it limits itself to social action and refrains from making knowledge-claims that serve as tools of the powerful. But if, according to Rorty, (...) religion per se is no longer the problem, then what becomes of his efforts to endorse a more general public–private distinction? The argument set forth assesses the inadequacies and limitations of Rorty’s assumptions about the public–private split and suggests another way of framing the issue that will prove productive in debates concerning the role of religion in the public square. (shrink)

This dissertation defends an ideal of democratic citizenship inspired by John Dewey’s theory of human flourishing, or “growth.” In its emphasis on the interrelatedness of individual development and social progress, Deweyan growth orients us toward a morally substantive approach to addressing the important question of how diverse citizens can live together well. I argue, however, that Dewey’s understanding of growth as a process by which conflicting interests, beliefs, and values are integrated into a more unified whole—both within the community and (...) within the self—is inadequate to the radical pluralism characteristic of contemporary liberal democratic societies. Given the pragmatist insight into the crucial role of socialization in identity formation, the problem with conceptualizing the ideal self as an integrated unity is that, for many, the complexity and diversity of our social world presents an insuperable obstacle to sustaining a unified (or always unifying) self. Most of us have multiple “selves” forged by the various groups with whom we identify and the often incongruous roles we play in our personal, professional, and/or public lives. Hence I offer a reconstruction of Deweyan growth that accounts for persistent yet positively valued diversity, both within the self and within the community. On the view I urge, which draws on the work of neopragmatist Richard Rorty and Chicana feminist Gloria Anzaldua, divisions within the self and between citizens are not merely problems always to be overcome, but potential resources for creating a stronger, more inclusive democracy. (shrink)