A few things online that caught my attention this week:
Paper and the Massachusetts Historical Society
James LaGrand on The War on Poverty
Elias Altman reviews Lucien Jaume, Tocqueville: The Aristocratic Sources of Liberty
George Marsden reviews David Hollinger, After Cloven Tongues of Fire: Protestant Liberalism in Modern American History
Religion and politics at the AHA
Am I a liberation theologian? Chris Gehrz has some fun with Google
Molly Worthen on creationism and Texas textbooks
The Digital Atlas of American Religion
Liz Covart summarizes J.L. Bell’s posts on Deborah Champion
Material culture in the classroom
Digital history at the AHA
Darryl Hart on Catholic intellectuals and local Catholic culture
Conference on Faith and History Biennial Meeting : Call for Papers
An aerial view of Messiah College
Thx for the link to Marsden.
Politics is not a suitable place for serious discussions or debates about anything, let alone religion. But the public academy can provide just such a forum. It should be a model for dealing with issues of diversity, including religiously based diversity, in public life. For instance, a secularist such as Hollinger strongly holds a number of beliefs about human rationality and moral principles. The public academy provides the best place where there might be debate about whether non-theistic assumptions provide adequate grounds for such views or whether some sort of theism might provide better grounds. Those issues are not going to be easily settled, of course, but universities are the best places where such civil discussions should continue to take place and be encouraged.
Hollinger and his ilk are more precisely defined as “materialists,” who of course abolish not just religion but metaphysics.
“Secularists” cedes them too much, that they are “neutral,” and therefor anything beyond the material is “woo,” and strictly out of order in any intellectual discussion.
Look forward to hearing your take on Marsden's new book, Tom.
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