Scribd Logo
Upload

Welcome to Scribd!

  • Gedicks, Gods of Our Fathers

    Uploaded by

    Rudolf Rijgersberg
    55 views15 pages

    Original Title

    Gedicks, Gods of Our Fathers(1)(3)(4)

    Copyright

    © © All Rights Reserved

    Available Formats

    PDF or read online from Scribd

    Did you find this document useful?

    Is this content inappropriate?

    Report this Document

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    55 views15 pages

    Gedicks, Gods of Our Fathers

    Uploaded by

    Rudolf Rijgersberg

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    of 15
    VOL. 18, ISSUE 4 “MAY 2010 ASTUDENT PUBLICATION (OF THE WILLIAM & MARY ‘SCHOOL OF LAW GOD OF OUR FATHERS, GODS FOR OURSELVE! FUNDAMENTALISM AND POSTMODERN BELIEF Frederick Mark Gedicks" yTRopUCTION: BUT WHICH ONE? LL THE DEMISE OF METANARRATIVE, TL THERISE OF SPIRITUALITY. : TIL THE PERSISTENCE OF FUNDAMENTALISM . . : IV. THE ADAPTATION OF DOCTRINE: A FUNDAMENTALIST TURN? « A. Free Exercise Decisions B. Anti-Establishment Decisions INTRODUCTION: BUF WHICH ONE? God is back. ohn Micklethwait & Adrian Wooldridge (2009)! ‘Westen euture has been obsessed withthe “death of God" at last since Nietzsche.? During the 1900s, this took the form of a predition—mostly by intellectual elites that modernization had so preempted belie hat the attr would eventually dssppear entirely? That prediction turned outtobe spectacularly wrong * Guy Andenion Chait & Profesor of Law, Brigham Young University Law School; potickslaw bys. Tam grate for comment and criticisms fom my fend and periodic o-uthor Roger Head fom my colleague ta BYU law fc colloquium discussing an earlier drat of this Esay and fom participants tthe Bill of Rights Journal symposium. Will Hains and ‘Alison ShiocavaMilesprovidedencellentrescarch sistance, and BYU Research rain Galea Fetcher was (a aways) indiapensable indenting ad nding dificult sources. “Tis Essay revisits end extends themes that discussed in my 2006 Annual Lect for the Center for ChurchiState Studies at DePaul Univesity See Frederick Mark Gedicks, Spots, Pundamentalio, Liber Religion a the End of Modery, $4 PAULL. REV. 1197 2005), * Sou Mickzerawarr & ApRiaN WooLDRIDa®, Goo Is BACK: HOW THE GLOBAL Revival oF Faris CHANOD THE WORLD 27 2009). See FRUEDICH NETZSCHE, TH GAY SCHNCE § 108, at 167, § 125, ot 181 (Walter XKaulinan rane, Random House 1974) 2d ed 1887) ° Willa H.Swatos, i Kevi J. Chestano, Secularization Theory: The Cours of «Cone 0 Soe, RELXAON208, 214 (1999) Stephen Warner, Workin Progress Toward 901 902 WILLIAM & MARY BILL OF RIOHTS JOURNAL —_[Vol. 18:901 {nthe United States iftnot elsewhere,’ so here the obsession has lately show itself 1s denial: God isnot only not dead, he'snot even sick. Popular and academic litera- tureisnow filled with riumphant—and regretful—expositions ofthe contemporary vilbrance and vitality of religion* God has cheated death (or, atleast, Nietzsche). ‘Orhas he? There is the God whose death was widely predicted and theres the God who today is alive and wel, but they're not the same God. The God who died is the God of Christendom, who bound together Western society with a universal accourt ofthe world that did not survive the advent of postmodernism; this God, indeed is dead.” The God who remains alive is the one adapted to postmodernis the vitality of that God ison display in contemporary American religion, especially inthe spirituality movement The most pressing religious problem now confronting the worlds posed by believers who refuse to recognize the postmodern condition that thas brought about the demise ofthe first God and the rse ofthe second; Iwill refer tosuck believes as “fundamentalists.” All three ofthese phenomens—the death of ‘God, his rebirth in postmoderity, and his remnants in fundamentalism—are manifest inrecent religion clause decisions, though there ae also recent suggestions that the ‘Court may be poised to take a fundamentalist tur." Twill close with a suggestion linked to that most traditional of believing virtues, humility." 1. Tae, DEMISE OF METANARRATIVE God is dead. —Friedrich Nietsche (1882) ‘a ew Paradigm for the Sociological Study of Religion in the Untied States, 98 Aw. 1.80. 1044, 1046-47 (1993). * See, eg. Peter L. Berger, Secularization Falsified, PRS THINGS, Feb. 2008, at 23, 23-24, availabe at hitp/sthings com/article2008)01/002-sculariation falsified. * Compare Alan Wolte, And the Winner Is... ATLANTIC, Mat. 2008, at 56, 38-60 (rguing that the United States ian outlier and thatthe "most basic tenet” of secularization — “anat materil progress will slowly erode religious fervor”—remains “unassailable,” and dis- cussing data on worldwide religious belie and practice generated by the Pew Global Attudes Project, with PETER BERGEREET AL, RELIGIOUS AMERICA, SECULAR EUROPE?: ATHEME AND ‘VaniaTions 9-10 (2008) (arguing that Western Europe isthe outir, and that the secularization Inypohesis as proved false everywhere else inte world). © For triumph, see, eg, BERGERET AL, supra note 5; MICKLETIWArT& WOOLDRIDGE, supra note 1. For regret, se, e-, RICHARD DAWKINS, THE GOD DELUSION (2006); SAM HARKS, THE EXD OF FAITH: RELIGION, TERROR, AND THE FUTURE OF REASON (2004); ‘Cunistorte Hitchens, GoD Is Not GREAT: HOW RELIGION POISONS EVERYTHING (2007) * See ina Part * ‘See inf Pat. © See infa Pat I ‘See infa Pat V. "See ina Conclusion. "2 Merzscue, supra note 2, § 125, 181 2010) (Gop oF OUR FATHERS, GoDs FOR OURSELVES 903 Reports of God's death have been greatly exaggerated in the United States, and probably everywhere else except Western Europe. To be sure, the number of self- declared unbelievers inthe United States has dramatically risen inthe last half cen tury from about three percent of the population inthe 1950s to between eleven and sixteen percent ow, but still remains low relative tothe number ofbelievers!” Much ‘of the reported increase in unbelief, moreover, might be attributed to a mistake in statistical analysis: For yeas, those who declined to state areligious affiliation were categorized as unbelievers, whereas itnow appears that many ofthese folks acually believe in “God or some higher power." Indeed, some data suggest that as many as twenty-one percent of self-identified atheists actually believein "God ora universal spirit,”” which means that many unbelievers are more confused than unbelieving. ‘So was Nietzsche wrong? Some philosophers—notably Martin Heidegger— ‘maintain that the “death of God” is a metaphor signifying the end of metaphysics."* © See, eg, BAYLOR INST, FoR STUDIES OF RELIGION & DEP'T oF SOCIOLOGY, BAYLOR LUnIv, AMERICANPEETY INTHE2IST CENTURY II (2006) [hereinafter BaYLoRSTUDY] (epor- ing hat 89.3% of Americans identify themselves a members of religion, compared to 10.8% ‘who sel dentifyasunafiated with ny religious tradition), avaiable abtp:/werw baylor ‘edulcontentservicea/document php/33304 pdf, see also BARRY A. KOSMIN ET AL, (GaapuaTe Cin. oF THE Cry UNW. OP N.Y, AMERICAY RELIGIOUS IDENTIFICATION SURVEY 12-13 2001) (reporting 80.2% and 14.1%, respectively), available at hp/lwwwge-cony ‘dw/aculy/esearch_briefarstey findings htm; THE PEW FORUM ON RELIGION & PUB. Lire, US, RELGOUS LANDSCAPE SURVEY 20 (2008) (hereinafter PEW STUDY] (eforting 83.1% and 16.1% respectively), available af htp:/religions pewforum.org/pallmpot2 -religiou-landscape-studyfull pac See BAYLOR STUDY, supra not 13, a 12 (reporting that 62.9% of those slFidetifying sreligiousl unailiated believe in “God or some higher power"); PEW STUDY, sypranot 13, 45 (reporting approximately hry sx percent with respect to same group). °S See PEW STUDY, supra note 13, at. ' ‘See WILLIAM RICHARDSON, HEIDEGGER: THROUGH PHENOMENOLOGY TO THOUGHT 361-62 (ded. 1974). “God” for Nietzsche ... symbolizes the “wor,” the order, of meta- physics, To say that God is dead iso say that this metaphysical word fas lois vitality, has lost ll power o offer man something to which ‘he canbold fat orby which he can find his bearing, has come to mean ‘nothing a all... . Nietzache's word, “God is dead,” according to Heidegger, is bata simple declaration of fact, it desribes in astrking forma the metaphysical nism to which Nietzsche is witness. 1d (footnotes, patgraph indentation, and Latinisms deleted), accord Gio VATTIMO, AFTER (CurasriaNrry 3 (Luca D'Isanto tran, 2002). "God is dead” means nothing else than the fact that there is no ultimate foundstion. An analogous meaning ..is found in Heidegger’ polemics agains metaphysics —the whole European philosophical edition rom armenides on-—which believes itself capable of gasping the ultimate ‘oundstion of elit inthe form ofan objective structure lke an essence ‘ora mathematical truth which is given outside of ime. a 908 WILLIAM & MARY BILL OFRIGHTS JOURNAL (Vol. 18:901 “The “death of Gods the demise of “metanaratves,”o se Lyotard’ sterm!”—that +s, “general accounts of human nature and history that purport tobe independent of ‘time place, culture, and other contextual influences, andthat determine how know!- ‘edge and ruth re constituted" Metanarratives parport“to grasp the rue structure ‘of reality, the aws of history, andthe method for acquiring knowledge about the ‘only ‘truth “God is dead,” then, doesnot mean that there is no God, but rather ‘that there is nometaphysial or other foundation that enables humankind to demon- irate objectively the essential character of the world. The death of God marked the ‘birth of postmodern life—that is, life without hope for certain and éemonstrable “knowledge about how or what the world really is. Like the death of God, postmodemity is an understanding of the world both powerful and misunderstood. People often talk abou it sift were akind of ideo- logical fratemiy. “Ah,” they'llsay, “you only think there's no objectvity because _you'rea“postrodemist” just ike they might say, "you only ik Palin because you're ‘aconservative” or “You only hate the Yankees because you're a Red Sox fan,” a8 ‘ifpostmodernism were a matter of affiliation or commitment. But postmodernism jisnotan ideology to which one is persuaded oa fan club that one joins 38 Lyotard _argued, itis a condition —like gravity orthe weather. That we don’t go spinning off into space or hatitrains and snows, are not matters that one “chooses” > “commits” ‘to believe (or ot), but rather given conditions under which we live. Likewise with postmodemit: itis life without demonstrable knowledge about wha ie is" Postmodemity and the death of God ae an insightful (if provocative) account of our curent condition in the West. Like gravity andthe weather, their evidence is, all around s. Our age is marked by radical dissensus about the meaning of life, the reality ofthe world, and viruslly everything else that matters. Neither Enlighten ‘ment, nor Romnticism, nor Marxism, nor Capitalism, nor Science, nor Reason, not anything else tas provided a complete and uncontroversial explanation of the world that reveals its truth and reality.” Nor has religion served us any beter: Whether God exits, who of what God is, what life means (or doesn’t) as consequence ofthis (non)existence, what demands God makes on humankind, whether anc how one can reliably discover and understand these demands, to what extent those demands should © JeaN-FRANGOISLYOTARD, THE PosTMODERN CONDITION: AREFORTONKNOWLEDGE xiv (Geoff Bemington & Brian Massumi trans, 1984) (1979) (defining “postmodernist” 8 “ineredulty oward metanaraives"). Fredrick Mark Gedicks, Spirtualiy, Fundamentalism, Liberty: Religion atthe End of Modernity, $4 DEPAULL. REY. 1197, 1198-99 (2005) (citation omitted). > 'VaTTIO, supra note 16, at 86 % LYOTARD, supra note 17, aa 21 Soe Aaley Woodward Nisan the Postmodern in Vatimo's Wietsci,6 MINERVA: Aw steer J Pi $1, $7 (2002), tp://row u.ie/philos ("Postmodernty is generally thought to be characterized by the fragmentation of society into multiple, incommensurable forms of life,” none of which “can explain social reality asa whole”) ® See Godicks, supra note 18, a 1204-06. 2010) (Gop oF OuR FATHERS, GoDs FOR OURSELVES 905 be enaced o reflected in secular law, whether law can or should even be secular (or religious) —thereis no consensus account of such matters in the United States or the ‘world, and the possiblity of one is well beyond our grasp.” Of sourse, the end of metanarratives is not the end of Belief in metanarratives, ‘any more than the death of God ended belief in God. Plenty of people stil believe in ‘God who guarantees the ultimate meaning of the universe and arbitrate the truth ‘or falsity, good or evil, and right or wrong of every action in it—they just believe in different versions of this God,” which nicely demonstrates the point: The problemis not, “There is no God,” but rather, “There ae too many Gods,” innumerable versions, so many thatitis impossible to demonstrate whichis the true one, excepto those wko alreadybelieve init. This brings us back to God’s death as a metaphor forthe erd ‘of metanarratives: the one God, the God at the foundation ofthe world, the God of the God's eye view of the world a it really is, the God that stands astride the vod and generates the metaphysical order that keeps it from collapsing into chaos—this God, indeed, has died. TL THE RISE OF SPIRITUALITY Is God Dead? —Time Magazine (1966)* How does belief function, how does it “work,” in a postmodem world in which the one God has died? One response has been to refocus the objec of belief, from 8 ‘transcendent God to an immanent one.* If there are too many Gods, and no inter subject ve way of demonstrating which ofthemis cosmically the tre one one rational response is simply to choose the one who serves your needs the best, the one who “fts”—your lifestyle your preferences, oursituation, your beliefs aboutthe world. 1ts like tying on shoes—you just keep at it until you find the pair that looks and feels ‘good. in this way of thinking, if one cannot persuasively describe the one God of everyone, at least each person might identify the God who works for him or het. ‘Ths postmodem style of belief, sometimes called “spirituality,” is all about pr- sonal choice, treating religion asa taste or preference like any other consumer good” ‘There's no truth or falsity here, no right or wrong other than what works forthe See Frederick Mark Gedicks, Truth and Consequences: Mitt Romney, Proposition 8, ‘and Public Reason, 61 ALA. L- REV. 337, 49-51 (2010) (discussing the mukilicty,indetr- tninacy, individuation, and ubiquity of contemporary American belief) ™ Godicks, supra note 18, at 1216-17 ® Cover Art, TOE, Apr. 8, 1966. % See Gedics, supra note 18, st 1219 (ooting that {flor spiritually inclined Americans, religions about revelation ofthe immanent, rather than the transcendent”) Pd at 216-17, 906 WILLIAM & MARY BILLOF RIGHTS JOURNAL —_[Vol. 18:901 ‘believer, anymore than there's aight or wrong about the best flavor of ce cream.” (Butiyou're wondering... Ben & Jeny's Vanilla Heath Bar Crunch) Spirituality ‘counsels adherence toa faith or religion based onthe individual needs it satisfies, ‘rather than the trth-laimsit makes or the conversion experienceitmay generate.” ‘incorporates the consumer mentality ofthe market; believers stop for beliefs and practices, picking and choosing from among diverse and even incempatible denomi- ‘ations and traditions. Whereas the principal focus of raditional ign sits reve- lation of reality beyond the temporal sl the emphasis of spirituality ison revelation ofthat very self Thirty percent of Americans identify themselves as “spiritual, ‘but not religious." Postmodern seaibilities have also eroded traditional understandings of God and beliefin denominational Christianity, even among members of some historically conser- vative denominations.” Large numbers of teenage evangelicals forexample, donot believe nthe resunection and eject te dea of absolute rat, believing that “all reli- ious faiths teach equally vali truths.” Many members of the more theologically liberal Protestant nainline—American Baptists, Congregational, Episcopalian, Lutherans, Methodists, and Presbyterians —are skeptical about the divinity of Jesus, ™ Fora detailed discussion of postnodem pray, se id at 1215-19. > 1d. a 1218 » Seno, Rebeca Freach Shopping fr Religion: The Change in Everyday Religious Pratce and its Importance othe Law, $1 BUFF.L- REV. 127 (2003);36 also Stephen Stein, eligion/Reion in the United Stats: Changing Perspectives end Prospects, 81ND. L137, 7 000) arin tha} oominationalcagoris are oo longer licen orprimary religious identifier for many "Americas" See Godicks, supra note 18, a 1218 se alt ALAN WOLEE, THE TRANSFORMATION ‘or AssiucaN RELIGDN: HOW WE ACTUALLY Live OUR FAmTH 182-84 (2003);Ia.C. Lapa. 4 Rober Tut, TheDisinctive Place o Religious Enis in Our Contttionl Order, 87 ‘Vas L-Rev. 37, 67(2002 Atth time ofthe Framing, religion for many Americans, wat source ‘ofcompelesive understanding dou Divine Providence sath oder, ofthe universe. The rise of since, technology, pychounasis and ‘er probundy scularizig influences, however, has alized per- ‘ptions about the ole of religion. Fr many Americas, eligion is now affective, psychological, an interior, 1 ™ See eg, Poll:APost-Christan Naton?, NEWSWEEK, Ape. 3, 2009, a1 (emphasis “valable af wor-newweckcomid/192311. © See eg, Gods, supra ot 18, at 1216; Chases Truceart, elcome 0 she Next (Church, AMAT Aug. 1996, ot 37 (Sse he evangelical megachurch movement). Seale Bus, Christian Teens? Not Very, WALLST. July, 200, a W3 epartng. Sidings of evangelical yout minister Josh MeDowell ba ainey-oe percent ofbor-again teenage cvangelicals donot believe in absolte wut that ight maja” reject theresa rection, and hat nea sinty percent belive that “all religous faiths each equally valid wrath), 2010) Gop oF Our FATHERS, GoDs FOR OURSELVES 907 the Trinity, the literaity or historicity ofthe Bible, and Jesus's miracles, including the resurrection.” ‘The current market for belief is focused on meeting the needs of individuals, as individuals themselves define those needs. Hence the rise of the “therapeutic God,” the God of selP-ffirmation, the friendly and accepting and loving God who is so df= {erent from the wrathful God of uncompromising (because absolute) truth. Imma- rence has replaced transcendence as the focus of the search for God. Rather than ‘a search for the truth, religion has tured into a search for self. We have replaced the God of our fathers with Gods for ourselves. {IL Tite PexsissNCE OF FUNDAMENTALISM God is not dead. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1864) Another response to postmodernity is fundamentalist withdrawal. Withdrawal {is motivated by an unwillingness to make the compromises to one’s belief thst God is ‘not dead that arenecessitatedby a postmodern society.” Amish, polygamist Mormon, ‘and ultra-orthodox Jewish communities are examples of withdrawal, and illustrate as wel that i is nota common response to postmodemity “More conamon is the response of another kind of believer, who likewise rejects the death of God and the limits ofthe postmodem condition, but declines to retreat int the face ofits challenges. These believers affirm the God of our fathers, the God ‘ho is (fill) atively involved in the fight between truth and falsity, good and evil, right and wrong." They consequently affirm that one’s job asa believer inthis God ‘to fight that fight with him, by enacting his truths into law and aligning the govern- ‘ment with them.” These, too ae fundamentalists, those who not only maintain that they have the only truth—an unremarkable claim that many religions make, includ- ing my own—but that they know this ruth andthe God that guarantees it with such reliability and confidence that they are impelled to structure society around it** » Walter Russell Mead, God's Couniry?, FOREIGN AFF, Sept.-Oet, 2006, 24,30; ee also id. at 31 (describing the Protestant mainline ashaving a“lower estimate ofthe diference between Chistian end non-Christians than do the other majo forms of American Protes- ‘aatism,” and attaching litle importance to the “idea ofthe church as a supernatural society ‘whose members enjoy special grace”). ‘" Henay WADSWORTHLONGFELLOW, Christmas Bell (1868, reprinted iv THE COMPLETE Pornicat WoRkS OF HENRY WADSWORTH LONOFELLOW 319 (1899), ‘See Gedick, supra note 18, at 1219-20. dat 1223-24 » da 1220-21. id. 120-2. 908 Wittiam & Mary BiLt oF Ricirs JournaL —[Vol. 18901 ‘am, ofcourse, using “fundamentalist” in broader and less historical way than itis traditionally used in American religious history. The term originated in the reaction of Protestant evangelicals to the secularization and permissiveness ofthe ‘American 1920s." “fundamentalist in those days signified one who was ready to fightthese trends by retumning'o the “fundamentals” of evangelical Protestantism.” This original American fundamentalism was characterized by militant resistance to ‘modernism, deep comitmentto Biblical itraism and n excepionalist conception of truth, and nostalgia fora mythic er in which Protestant faith and morality were ‘widely shared among the poplace and reinforeed by government. "American fundamentalism snow only one manifestation ofa global fundamen- {alist movement that seeks to overtum secular society andto refill the ensuing vacuum ‘witha revitalized publi religion This global sense of “fundamentalist is attito-

    You might also like