Connolly's Mysterious Trinity Machine: A Panentheistic Reading

Abstract

Drawing Connolly's work into a conversation with Christian theology of a feminist and process persuasion, this article explores and builds upon the way in which Connolly offers a third way between the theistic certainties of George Bush's "Christian America" and the crass secularism of those who are and were appalled by the latter's religious fundamentalism. Discerning a secret Trinitarian structure in Connolly's immanent naturalism, though not the Father, Son and Ghost, the article explores the potentials for developing a counter-apocalyptic strategy for political theology that can counter fundamentalist drives and lay the basis for releasing new energies of earthly becoming.     

Political Correctness and Political Science: An Exploratory Study of New York State

Abstract

The term political correctness identifies a controversy that has gained wide coverage in the press over the last several years concerning academic policy in higher education in the United States. In an effort to obtain some preliminary indication of how widespread perceptions of political correctness are among political scientists, a survey of political scientists in New York State was conducted in December 1991. The survey revealed that at least in New York, political scientists are likely to perceive political correctness as an issue on their college campus and in the discipline but generally not in their departments.     

The “Realism” of Augustine's “Political Realism”: Augustine and Machiavelli

Abstract

Arendt and Tocqueville both celebrate a participatory notion of political freedom, but they have a fundamental disagreement about the role that political education should play in fostering an active citizenry. I contrast Tocqueville's “educative” conception of politics with Arendt's “performative” conception, and I explore an important but little-noted difference between the two theorists: whereas Tocqueville argues that it is the task of statesmen “to educate democracy,” Arendt warns that those who seek to “educate” adults are inappropriately aspiring to be their “guardians.” I argue that although Arendt's warnings about the dangers of intertwining politics and education are at times salutary, Tocqueville is ultimately correct that education must be a key task of democratic leadership, and he is right to suggest that politics can itself be educative in crucial ways.     

A Little Knowledge Is a Dangerous Thing: What We Know about the Role of the Media in State Politics

Abstract

This article explores the intellectual itinerary of the contemporary French political philosopher Pierre Manent. In particular, it highlights his efforts to do justice to the three great “poles” of human existence: philosophy, politics, and religion. Manent is shown to be a philosophically minded Christian, one who thinks politically and who rejects the temptation to “despise the temporal order.” Manent's reservations about the European project in its present form are shown to be rooted in a understanding of politics that emphasizes the need to weave together “communion” and “consent” if Europeans are to avoid administrative despotism and those postpolitical fantasies that prevent them from thinking and acting politically. The article ends with a reflection on Manent's impressive history of “political forms” in the Western world.     

Bringing Gender into the Evangelical-Capitalist Resonance Machine

Abstract

While William Connolly convincingly analyzes the pervasive anger and drive for revenge inhabiting much evangelical Christian writing, he overlooks the possibility that the emotional economies of evangelical women might differ from those of men. Several studies of right-wing Christian women suggest that grief, specifically grief over a loss related to children, is more formative of their political views than is rage. In contrast to the nostalgia expressed by Connolly's cowboy capitalists for an alleged pure market, these women long for a fictional time in America when the fetus was safe. Conservative religious women's grief and desire to protect vulnerable persons could resonate with progressive political projects of generosity and forbearance toward difference.     

The Politics of Preaching the Promised Land for the Canaanites

Abstract

This paper explores issues around European Christian theological prejudice against Jews and Judaism and asks whether attempts to make amends for the wrongs done to one people have blunted the conscience of Christians to the sufferings of another. It is ironic that the division between those who attribute anti-Semitism to New Testament texts and those who blame the misuse of the texts mirrors division over colonialist ideologies in the Old Testament. Should we blame the text or its interpreters? There is irony in the fact that those who wrestle with anti-Judaic texts in the New Testament are seldom the same people who perceive problems with the land traditions in the Old—or indeed the other way round! Evangelical Christian Zionist insensitivity towards the Palestinians derives from biblical fundamentalism. Mainstream Christian Zionism derives partly from guilt over past Christian crimes against the Jews but it also reveals a residual fundamentalist underpinning.     

Free Christian Speech: Plundering Foucault

Abstract

This article explores the meaning of free speech through an analysis of Michael Foucault's lectures on parrhesia in order to show how questions of freedom are bound up with questions of truth. The activity of speaking freely is a function of truth-telling rather than merely subject to regulative principles that underwrite claims of sovereignty. The Christian proclamation of the gospel extends Foucault's insights into a theological register and supplies a foil for considering some of the shortcomings of his constructive proposal. By surveying parrhesia in the New Testament, together with some attendant political implications, this article attempts to explain the political transformation enacted by those who bear witness to the gospel without sovereign benefits. The freedom of such speech, it is asserted, is irrespective of these benefits.     

An engineering career as industrial mission: Jack Keiser in post-war Britain

ABSTRACT

British mechanical engineer Jack Keiser’s postwar career in industrial education was simultaneously a career in justice work and Christian industrial mission. This paper examines the Christian critique of industry Keiser developed early in his career, as he transitioned in 1949–1950 into his life’s work in firm-based industrial education, and asks how historians of technology might interpret a critique that characterized industry in hyperbolic terms as enslaving or demonic. Keiser’s was part of an international critique connected to three important post-war Christian institutions: Student Christian Movement, the Industrial Mission Movement, and the World Council of Churches. He engaged with justice at both an intimate and a cosmic level, intimately through face-to-face relationships with apprentices and trainees under his supervision, and cosmically by engaging with the biblical prophets through whom God called for justice.     

Myths and the political use of religion in Christian Democratic culture

Abstract

In this essay, the author will attempt to analyze the overall relationship established between the party of Christian Democracy (so named for its affiliation with a traditional religion) and the phenomena of the sacralization of politics that have so profoundly shaped the character of mass parties in the twentieth century. The quest for consensus led the Catholic party to adopt a new language, based on mythical thinking and profoundly indebted – in content and mode of communication – to the experiences of totalitarianism. The active rivalry with political religions marked, both in the phase of development and in the process of communication, the forms of mass political expression of Christian Democracy. De Gasperi's proposal concerning the definition of new identities and political affiliations, both on the national level and on the broader Western level (both in European and Atlantic terms) was the product of a unique ideological development in keeping with the requirements of modern mass politics.     

Christianity and Political Engagement in Post-Apartheid South Africa

Abstract

This paper focuses specifically on the impact of the Christian churches on the social, cultural and political contexts of South Africa. It considers the political role of the mainline Christian churches and their ecumenical bodies during the apartheid era. In post-apartheid South Africa, the social and political context has changed and the Christian churches relate to this new context in varied ways. The rapid growth and proliferation of Christian churches under forces of globalization to some extent undermines social cohesion and development. The traditional practice of the public gathering, or imbizo, is particularly threatened. This article therefore seeks to address the question of whether Christian institutions in a rapidly globalizing Africa are an asset or liability for promoting identity and belonging, social cohesion, and the development of social capital.     

Lost priests in ancient Mangaia

Abstract

Politics and religion in Polynesia are one and same, both concerned with appropriating and controlling sources of mana. William Wyatt Gill collected priestly lists from various Mangaians, but only published those from the reigning ariki, Nūmangātini. The lists show significant variations, suggesting that some priests disappeared partly because of their gender, but more especially due to political considerations, notably rival claims to legitimacy and authority among the various lineages and kin groups who competed for these titles. These variations highlight how particular accounts make different claims on the past, and how the Christian missions minimised the significance of sacred women who possessed great mana. By publishing Nūmangātini's version, Gill fits the missionary preference for supporting the political establishment, and echoes New Zealand's Stephenson Percy Smith, who embraced Hoani Te Whatahoro Jury's interpretation of the Māori migration, thereby marginalising knowledge claims of others.     

James Naughtie,The Accidental American: Tony Blair and the Presidency

Abstract

The terms "justice" and "necessity" are often employed in discussions of war. The just war tradition seeks to delineate when wars are and are not just; other theologians who do not find this approach helpful may nevertheless resort to the logic of necessity. Although unjust, some wars may still be deemed necessary. Barth employs both the language and logic of justice and necessity in his approach to war. The purpose of this paper is to address Barth's exposition of war in relation to his approach to divine justice and the necessity of Christian affliction. It does not attempt to make any large claims about the just war tradition or other approaches to war. Rather, it is intended to be an immanent critique of Barth from Barth's own theology, showing that, although consistent with his view of church and state, Barth's theology of war is inconsistent with his view of both God's character as just and the external necessity of affliction to Christian witness.     

The Canada-US Relationship: An Updated Evaluation of Public Opinion

ABSTRACT

Despite the political turbulence of the Trump-Trudeau era, the US-Canada relationship remains workable on many policy fronts. Against this backdrop, this article explores this relationship by first focusing on public opinion toward “the other,” including general sentiments as well as political leadership specifically, before turning to public opinion in specific policy fields, such as bilateral trade, security, energy, and diplomacy. We broadly find that Canadians are more likely than Americans to draw distinctions between Canada and the US and view the relationship in more cautious terms. By contrast, opinion in the US appears to be much more positive about the relationship.     

Obeying,Believing and Rebelling

Abstract

This article offers a decisive alternative to a growing consensus within public theology that political liberalism represents the pro-Pelagian, atomistic and un-ecclesial face of modernity. Through a careful reappraisal of the sceptical theology of Michel de Montaigne I claim that contemporary Christian advocates of liberalism can develop a deeply Augustinian counter-account which has the ability to reconcile notions of individual autonomy and conscience with a strong sense of ecclesial authority. At the centre of this innovative settlement, I point to the value of Montaigne’s theological anthropology, which, in its sensitivity to human fragility and sin, offers a rich validation of pluralistic and tolerant societies by contesting absolutist claims to both knowledge and power. In framing political liberalism in these explicitly theological terms, such an account comes into sharp confrontation with the movement known as Radical Orthodoxy, which has defined the liberal tradition as intrinsically anathema to an authentically Christian understanding of politics. In contrast, this article claims that political liberalism, far from being automatically antagonistic to Christian theological commitments, can be justified by them.     

The Trials Of Theology

Abstract

Theology experiences many trials of practice and interpretation as it charts a course through contemporary society's political and cultural challenges. September 11 has generated more such trials, some of which are concerned with the historic issues surrounding the ‘War on America’ and its defence in terms of Christian rhetoric and belief. This article begins with a consideration of some of the background to this defence in the language and events of the American Civil War, particularly Stonewall Jackson's dying words and their juxtaposition with Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. It then considers the validity of such notions as freedom and justice in contemporary debate, and challenges an understanding of Christian political thought that views it as responsible for defending a particular form of western society. It ends with some trenchant conclusions about a theologian's responsibilities in the present and future world.     

How Theological is Political Theology? The Case of Twentieth-Century American Protestantism

ABSTRACT

How theological is political theology? Twentieth century American Protestantism illustrates that the answer depends on more than the extent to which a political theology is theological. For example, Walter Rauschenbusch and subsequent emancipatory political theologians understand theology's political significance very differently than John Howard Yoder and other political theologians influenced by the Radical Reformation. Nevertheless, both groups conceive the Christian gospel as a politics and so concur that Christian theology is essentially political. By contrast, Reinhold Niebuhr interpreted the gospel as disclosure of God's mercy and therefore denied that Christian theology is primarily a politics--for society or the church. Hence, although all three of these political theologies are thoroughly theological, they are not political in the same manner or for the same reasons. Accordingly, in addition to quantitative considerations, ascertaining theology's place in political theology involves discerning how a political theology is theological and why a theology is political.     

Ethics Appropriate for an Empire: A Question Whose Time Has Come

Abstract

This article offers a Christian ethical commentary upon the debate over the contemporary "American Empire." While many decry unprecedented US global dominance based on various secular standpoints, few have articulated religiously-grounded perspectives on this new US relation to the world. The task of mustering religious objections to openly imperial ambitions looms particularly large in light of prominent unabashed defenses of US global hegemony. The paper has three parts: (1) preliminary clarifications regarding terminology and context; (2) a survey of policies (e.g., unilateralism in foreign policy, interventions, a doctrine of pre-emptive war, diminished regard for international institutions) that reflect imperial ambitions and conflict with mainstream Christian perspectives on global justice and self-determination; and (3) a tentative listing of seven criteria appropriate for the pursuit and exercise of power on the part of global hegemons, in light of Christian principles. The constructive task is aimed at offering ethical constraints, such as the judicious correlation of means and ends in foreign policy. We will evaluate the contributions of Catholic social thought and the school of Christian realism on key questions: Is the notion of empire ever morally acceptable? Is "benevolent hegemony" possible in our times? If so, on what terms?     

How Christianity Won the World

ABSTRACT

This article traces the ideology that allowed Christian civilization to conquer the world. It opens with a view of biblical “national” foundation myths, the Exodus and the Babylonian Exile, and shows how this ideology also allowed for ethnic cleansing, if not genocide, and how those played a dominant role in the mind of western Christians who simply adopted the biblical attitude to foreign nations as their own. A changing perspective including a not so historically dominated reading of the Bible may put an end to the western idea of a God given right to oppress all the nations of the world.     

Becoming the ‘party of civil rights’: the Radical Party, 1962–1979

ABSTRACT

The article reconstructs how the Italian Radical Party became, from the mid-1960s, the party of ‘civil rights’, and what its main battles for these rights were between 1967 and 1979. In the Italian political system the Party played a crucial role in the process of re-institutionalization that took place in the 1970s, helping to transfer demands formulated in social and cultural terms since the 1960s to the legislative-institutional level. Making the battle for civil rights the object of their own political action had a systemic meaning for the Radicals – namely, to undermine the dominion of the Christian Democrats and redefine the relations between the political sphere and society. This was closely linked to the political strategy of the party and to the organizational form it gave itself from 1967 onwards. These aspects, however, did not remain unchanged between 1967 and 1979; rather, they fed on the Radicals’ evolving vision of Italian society (on its social turmoil) on the one hand, and on the other they reacted to the evolution of the Italian political scenario, in particular to the possibility of building a parliamentary alternative to the Christian Democracy.