November 20th, 2009

Jürgen Habermas and Charles Taylor in conversation

posted by The Editors

rethinkingIn a symposium convened by the Institute for Public Knowledge at NYU, the Social Science Research Council and the Humanities Institute at Stony Brook University, Judith Butler, Jürgen Habermas, Charles Taylor, and Cornel West came together last month to discuss the project of “rethinking secularism.” Today we are posting audio and a transcript of the October 22 discussion between Habermas and Taylor, moderated by Craig Calhoun, in which the two leading philosophers discuss the place of religion in the public sphere and whether there are differences in kind between religious and secular reasons. (Listen to the paper presentations that preceded this discussion here. Add your own voice to the discussion here.)

Read Jürgen Habermas and Charles Taylor in conversation.
November 19th, 2009

Christian moderns

posted by Webb Keane

I argue that the moral narrative of modernity is a projection onto chronological time of a view of human moral and pragmatic self-transformation. This narrative, and the concrete projects it entails, runs into certain ubiquitous problems that arise from the material dimensions of human sociality and subjectivity. Protestantism was, historically, one major source of practices and concepts that express and try to control these problems. It was also a force for their circulation well beyond the Protestant, or even the religious, sphere as such.

Read Christian moderns.
November 18th, 2009

The cheese, the worms, and Major Hasan

posted by Winnifred Fallers Sullivan

What does the academic study of religion have to contribute to public discussions concerning Major Hasan’s religious identity? What do we know about religion and religious identity? We are worried about stereotypes and we are anxious, but what do we know?

Read The cheese, the worms, and Major Hasan.
November 17th, 2009

Taxing yoga: exercise or spiritual practice?

posted by The Editors

Earlier this month, the Associated Press reported on a controversy that erupted over the decision by Missouri tax authorities to require yoga centers to collect and pay a sales tax on their classes. Yoga instructors have argued that they should be exempt from the tax “because the lessons include spiritual elements.” In this week’s off the cuff feature, we’ve invited a small handful of scholars to comment on the legal and cultural status of yoga and on the right of states to levy taxes on yoga centers.

Read Taxing yoga: exercise or spiritual practice?.
November 16th, 2009

So you want to be a new atheist

posted by Kathryn Lofton

saved by atheismIf you want to be a New Atheist, first and foremost, you need to possess an unrelenting desire to help. The desire may seem at times cruel, but you have to start focusing on a higher good: the goal here is to get the cannibals to put down their wafer and wine glass. It’s not for your wellness, but for the good of mankind.

Read So you want to be a new atheist.
November 13th, 2009

Life after past evil: an interview with Daniel Philpott

posted by Nathan Schneider

Professor Daniel Philpott is a leading theorist of global politics and religion at the University of Notre Dame’s Department of Political Science and Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. He is the author of the forthcoming Just and Unjust Peace: An Ethic of Political Reconciliation, which proposes a comprehensive conceptual framework for peacebuilding in the wake of conflict.

Read Life after past evil: an interview with Daniel Philpott.
November 9th, 2009

Talal Asad and Abdullahi An-Na’im in conversation

posted by The Editors

Talal Asad and Abdullahi An-Na’im both stand at the forefront of the challenging and constructive exchange taking place today between European and Islamic traditions of political, legal, and religious thought. At a recent event organized by Georgetown University’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs, the two scholars traded questions and criticisms concerning the concept of human rights. Moderated by José Casanova, the discussion addressed the intrinsic limitations and historical failures of the language of human rights, as well as its formidable capacity to challenge autocratic and state-centric distributions of power, creating openings for democratic contestation and political self-determination. The following is a short excerpt of the conversation, which is available for download in its entirety here (pdf). You can see video from the event at here & there.

Read Talal Asad and Abdullahi An-Na’im in conversation.
October 30th, 2009

Age of spirit: an interview with Harvey Cox

posted by Nathan Schneider

Harvey Cox (CC: sushiesque)In September, Harvey Cox retired after 44 years of teaching at Harvard Divinity School. Retirement, however, has not slowed him down. Last month saw the release of his latest book The Future of Faith, which, in the spirit of his 1965 classic The Secular City, dares to declare that a drastically different role for religion in society is close at hand.

Read Age of spirit: an interview with Harvey Cox.
October 28th, 2009

Sacramental poetics

posted by Regina Schwartz

By its very nature, mystery is much more difficult to speak about, and certainly to track.  But religious ritual claims to offer mystery as well as sociality. It claims to make the transcendent immanent, and transcendence—whether vertical or horizontal, above or beyond—is the sphere of the sacred, of what is beyond our comprehension, control and use. We can point to it, sign it, and by doing so, evoke it. But that “beyond” is more than we can say, hear, touch, taste or even understand.

Read Sacramental poetics.
October 23rd, 2009

Open thread: the power of religion in the public sphere

posted by Ruth Braunstein and David Kyuman Kim

Four of the world’s leading public intellectuals came together yesterday in the historic Great Hall at Cooper Union to discuss “Rethinking Secularism.” In an electrifying symposium convened by the Institute for Public Knowledge at NYU, the Social Science Research Council and the Humanities Institute at Stony Brook University, Judith Butler, Jürgen Habermas, Charles Taylor, and Cornel West gave powerful accounts of religion in the public sphere. The Immanent Frame invites you to respond to the symposium presentations by submitting comments in the space below.

UPDATE: Listen to audio of the event here.

Read Open thread: the power of religion in the public sphere.