A post by Steve Shakespeare over at the new Philosophy and Religious Practices network blog on putting philosophy and religion into dialogue.
The third in a series of posts over at the Philosophy and Religious Practices blog, introducing those closely involved with this new research network. This one is about me.
The second in a series of posts over at the Philosophy and Religious Practices blog, introducing those closely involved with this new research network.
The first in a series of posts over at the Philosophy and Religious Practices blog, introducing those closely involved with this new research network.
The overarching difference between the other contributors [to the book Reexamining Deconstruction and Religion: Toward a Religion with Religion] and me can be seen as a debate between a postmodernism that descends from Kant and a postmodernism that descends from Hegel. We both take our lead from postmodern critiques of modernist rationality, but we strike out on different paths from that common point of departure. They think that postmodernism plays the role of Kant on the contemporary scene, whereas I think it plays the role of Hegel. They think postmodernism is the contemporary way to delimit knowledge in order to make room for faith. I think that it is a strategy they have come up with for limiting the exposure of Christian faith to postmodern analysis and that postmodernism interprets Christianity more holistically and comprehensively by treating religion as an historical form of life…
…On the Kantian model, postmodernism provides a shelter in which believers can keep their faith dry; it is no more than a way to delimit atheism in order to make room for Christians to lay claim to representational truths about Christ and God. On my Hegelian model, postmodernism returns any given community of believers to the living-breathing, concrete-determinate, linguistic-historical form of life to which it belongs … and in which its truth is generated, nourished, and expressed.
They think that they are loyal to the concrete and determinate and criticize me for taking flight from the concrete. … I think they are in fact avoiding the contingency of the concrete and determinate, which goes all the way down.
"Review by Neal DeRoo of J. Aaron Simmons and Stephen Minister’s edited collection about the work of Jack Caputo, Reexamining Deconstruction and Determinate Religion: Toward a Religion with Religion (Duquesne University Press, 2012), from Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, 2013.02.27.
The book as a whole is critical of Caputo’s Derridean ‘religion without religion’, but fundamentally misunderstands the way in which such a ‘religion without religion’ is a form of faith that can be had both with and without (and, therefore, ‘with/out’) the historical determinate religions and spiritualities of the world - which my forthcoming book from Ashgate will make clear. Religion without religion does not, then, amount to a rejection of the propositional truth claims of particular religions, as many of the contributors suggest, but leads to a reconceptualisation of truth itself.
As Neal explains,
…as a ‘way of life’, the truth of religion is verified in its vitality, not its correctness - and there is more than one way for people to live vital lives.
Pete Rollins:
I should clarify that I am not a religious Christian, so I am not working with (or against) theistic categories.
But I am a Christian, just not in the religious or spiritual sense. I argue that Christianity is materialist in my work.
Review by Ellen Armour of John D. Caputo and Linda Martin Alcoff, eds., Feminism, Sexuality and the Return of Religion (Indiana University Press, 2011), in Notre Dame Philosophical Review.
Dan and I just submitted an abstract for this “Impact of Religion: Challenges for Society, Law and Democracy” conference, May 20-23 2013, Uppsala University, Sweden. We had a lovely abstract for an organised panel session where we’d give a paper each. The call for papers said 200 word paper abstracts, so we figured we could have 400 words for a panel session abstract. But then I had to butcher it down to this to get it to fit in the designated box (1300 characters) in the online abstract submission system. Grrr.
Panel Session Title
THE IMPACT OF RESEARCH ON RELIGION IN A HUMANITIES CONTEXT
Panel Session Abstract
Humanities research on religion has typically been marginalised, and often for good reason. Its ‘disregard of reality’ (as Brian Clack puts it) is damning when it comes to its lack of engagement with actual religious practices. Yet the wager of this panel is that the Humanities do have much to offer research on religion.
Organised by the UK’s Philosophy and Religious Practices Network, this panel considers not just the impact of religion on society but the social impact of research on religion. That is, what is of interest here is the way in which Humanities research can and should feed back into the everyday lives of religious practitioners and, in particular, what distinctive contribution philosophy of religion and theology can make to concrete religious discourse and practice.
We provide the context for contemporary engagement in the Humanities with lived religion and recent attempts to overcome (especially) philosophy of religion’s famed indifference here, honing in on two specific areas in which philosophy of religion can play a distinctive role in research on religion, society, law and democracy. We then introduce a series of impact events designed to explore how the impact of Humanities research on religion be encouraged and measured.
“My atheism gets on in the churches, all the churches, do you understand that?” -- Jacques Derrida
Subverting the Norm — a two-day event that brings together pastors, theologians, philosophers, church practitioners, and researchers in religion — asks a follow-up question:Can postmodern theology live in the churches? As such, we are interested in presentations that explore the relationship between radical theologies and the church.
Read moreData on ‘other religions’ from the 2011 Census.
Video summary of Census 2011 data on religion in England and Wales (part of this press release).
New book on deconstruction and religion, Re-Examining Deconstruction and Determinate Religion: Toward a Religion with Religion, from Duquesne University Press, edited by J. Aaron Simmons and Stephen Minister, with an important contribution from Jack Caputo, “On Not Settling for an Abridged Postmodernism”, as well as essays by Merold Westphal and Bruce Ellis Benson.
The charge of religious abstractionism has long been levelled at both Derrida and Caputo, so it’ll be interesting to see if there are any new contributions to this debate. Going by the book’s subtitle, though, “Toward a Religion with Religion”, I’m worried the volume as a whole will end up domesticating the radicality of “deconstructive religion”, but we’ll have to see. I’ve already ordered my copy, but it’ll be delayed until January. Hmph.
Here are some endorsements, originally posted on the Other Journal’s Church and Pomo blog:
“Faith after deconstruction? And religion too? It seems so on reading this bold new collection: not that “old time religion” but perhaps an “old-new religion.” Among other things, this book picks a fight with John D. Caputo and his “weak God,” and boy does he ever come back with fists swinging!” – Kevin Hart (University of Virginia)
“This pioneering volume explores the philosophical, theological, and practical implications of deconstructing religion — and what comes after. Bringing together the most radical insights of contemporary phenomenology and hermeneutics, the authors challenge us to rethink faith in the postmodern agora. A very timely intervention in the ongoing debate about God with or without religion.” – Richard Kearney, Charles Seelig Chair of Philosophy, Boston College
Public discussion of religion tends to polarize between two extremes: religious fundamentalism, and the aggressive atheism of such writers as Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens. But much of what people actually believe falls somewhere in between. It is subtler and more tentative. David Cayley explores the work of five thinkers whose recent books have charted new paths for religion.
This episode features Jack Caputo, but there are also episodes with Richard Kearney, William Cavanaugh, James Carse and Roger Lundin.
