Beyond Church and State: Democracy, Secularism, and Conversion
Cambridge University Press
Edition: Reprint, 10/15/2015
EAN 9781107579439, ISBN10: 1107579430
Paperback, 252 pages, 22.9 x 15.2 x 1.4 cm
Language: English
Secularism is often imagined in Thomas Jefferson's words as 'a wall of separation between Church and State'. This book moves past that standard picture to argue that secularism is a process that reshapes both religion and politics. Borrowing a term from religious traditions, the book goes further to argue that this process should be understood as a process of conversion. Matthew Scherer studies Saint Augustine, John Locke, John Rawls, Henri Bergson and Stanley Cavell to present a more accurate picture of what secularism is, what it does, and how it can be reimagined to be more conducive to genuine democracy.
Acknowledgments
Introduction
beyond the separation of church and state
secularism as conversion
1. The authorized narrative and crystalline structure of conversion in Augustine's Confessions
2. Toleration and conversion in Locke's letters
it is 'above all things necessary to distinguish'
3. The crystalline structure of conversion
Henri Bergson's Two Sources
4. Saint John (Rawls), the miracle of secular reason
5. The wish for a better life
Stanley Cavell's critique of the social contract
Conclusion
from Supernovas into The Deep
secularism as conversion, a conversion of secularism
Index.