Civil Religion
A special issue of Religions (ISSN 2077-1444). This special issue belongs to the section "Religions and Health/Psychology/Social Sciences".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 December 2022) | Viewed by 488
Special Issue Editor
Interests: political philosophy and theory; classical political thought; modern political thought; political theology; religion and politics; political ideologies; international relations in political philosophy
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
In an age of wide-spread modernization and its accompanying processes of secularization, a leading question for scholars continues to be why religious belief persists and thrives. An equally interesting question for many scholars would be: why does civil religion still seem necessary and why does it continue to thrive in multiple, sometimes contradictory, forms? Was Rousseau correct when, coining the term (religion civil), he asserted that a civil religion is a necessary ingredient of the moral and spiritual foundations of any society, since reason alone is unable to secure political authority? We still question if this is the case even in a society that operates on a largely secular and—pragmatically speaking—atheistic basis.
What kinds of political, sociological, and anthropological problems do studies of civil religion address? Are all expressions of civic religion broadly equivalent as a secularization of Rousseau’s assertion? If secular civil religions do persist, are they merely vestigial expressions of human superstitions, or do they speak to something deeper and irreducibly human that attempts at totalistic secularization expunge at our political peril?
Scholars from all humanistic, social scientific, or other relevant disciplines are invited to submit proposals or papers on any question pertinent to this timely topic.
I look forward to receiving your contributions.
Prof. Dr. Thomas Heilke
Guest Editor
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Keywords
- civil religion
- secularization
- religion and politics
- reason and revelation
