Religion and Twentieth-Century American Intellectual Life

Addresses the place of religious thought and values in America's 'high' culture: Those educated cultural elites devoted to science, scholarship, and intellectual life generally. This volume comprises a set of original essays written by leading authorities in the fields of intellectual history, the history of religion, and theology.

Concerned primarily with relations between Protestant Christianity and the main currents in secular intellectual life over the course of the past century, the essays in this volume disclose the persistence, complexity, and fragility of religious thought in the new university dominated intellectual environment of the modern period. Arguing that three important patterns of response emerged from the challenges to religious belief posed by nineteenth-century science and scholarship - the traditionalist, the naturalist, and the modernist responses - the volume is organized to bring out the continuing interplay of reciprocal influences among them. The contributors show that a dialectic between naturalistic and religious points of view has contributed significantly to the character and style of modern American thought.

1. Religion and American intellectual history, 1945–85: reflections on an uneasy relationship Henry F. May; 2. Evangelicals and the scientific culture: an overview George M. Marsden; 3. An enthusiasm for humanity: the social emphasis in religion and its accommodation in Protestant theology William McGuire King; 4. John Dewey, American theology, and scientific politics Bruce Kuklick; 5. The Niebuhr brothers and the liberal Protestant heritage Richard Wightman Fox; 6. Justification by verification: the scientific challenge to the moral authority of Christianity in modern America David A. Hollinger; 7. On the scientific study of religion in the United States 1870–1980 Murray G. Murphey; 8. On the intellectual marginality of American theology Van A. Harvey; Afterword: theology, public discourse, and the American tradition David A. Tracy; About the authors; Index.

Concerned primarily with relations between Protestant Christianity and the main currents in secular intellectual life over the course of the past century, the essays in this 1989 volume disclose the persistence, complexity, and fragility of religious thought in the new university dominated intellectual environment of the modern period.