From: Scott R (jse885@spinn.net)
Date: Tue Oct 01 2002 - 00:50:29 BST
Matt,
My main reply to all this is what I concluded with in my previous post:
"I do think that Pirsig's metaphysics, and religious stances in general,
need the challenge of post-modern criticism. As I've mentioned before, I
think one author who has met this challenge is Robert Magliola, in
"Derrida on the Mend". The result is definitely not any old-time
metaphysics."
But, even without going that far, between Carter and Rorty, I am more on
Rorty's side, in that Carter is a fairly conservative sort of
religionist (though definitely not a fundamentalist). As soon as one
starts wanting to teach a particular religion in a public school or pass
laws based on particular religious beliefs, I am with the secularist.
The limit is crossed, however, when secularist beliefs are taught as
fact. (Darwinism, for example, though better that than creationism. Or
the belief that early peoples "made up" myths to "explain" natural
phenomena.)
My problem with Rorty's "Religion stops the conversation" is that he,
like most intellectuals, has seemed to have stopped his own conversation
with the kind of arguments to be found in, say, Russell's "Why I am not
a Christian", which arguments are for the most part valid. Christianity,
however, has moved on. He (Rorty) doesn't seem to be aware of writers
like Peter Berger ("The Heretical Imperative"), whose thesis is that any
intellectual has got to be aware that his or her own religion is just
one of many, and there is no reason (short of personal revelation) for
insisting that one's own is the correct one. Or Don Cupitt as another
example, for whom God, much less Heaven and Hell, is an outmoded
concept, and there are many more. While there are plenty of Catholic
priests who fit your caricature, there are also plenty who have left
that long behind.
So, yes, we must keep with the Jeffersonian compromise, since there are
still far too many people ready to shove their particular religion down
the throats of all. But there is also plenty of conversation to be had.
Which is not to say that I think Rorty, or anybody, is somehow required
to take part. Only that one has a responsibility to recognize that
religion is not limited to the "because God said so" kind of argument.
As Magliola and others point out, Buddhists figured out the need for
deconstruction 2000 years ago.
- Scott
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