Page 208 - Stati inu obstati, revija za vprašanja protestantizma, letnik XVII (2021), številka 34, ISSN 2590-9754
P. 208
povzetki, SYNOPSES, ZUSAMMENFASSUNGEN
žaju, da bi lahko privzeli kot samoumevno, da imajo njihovi sogovorniki iste religiozne
predpostavke kot oni« (Stout 2004, 97).
Ključne besede: pragmatizem, religija, sekularizem, verska svoboda, etika
Religious Moral Languages, Secularity, and Hermeneutical Injustice
Jeffrey Stout’s “modest pragmatism”, as a philosophical approach to public moral
discourse in a religiously plural society, has received a mixed response from the opposite
sides of the secularism debate. On the one hand, influential theologians and communi-
tarian thinkers (e.g. Stanley Hauerwas) have claimed that Stout concedes too much to
the secularists. On the other hand, secularists (e.g. Richard Rorty) have found Stout’s
inclusive approach towards religious reasonings in public discourse all too theological.
This essay is based on the conviction that Stout’s attempt at mediating between the
political theology of Christian communitarians and the liberal visions of public dis-
course – say, versions by Rorty, Habermas and Rawls, respectively – deserves a re-exam-
ination and further analysis in the light of recent work in epistemology of democracy
and pragmatist philosophy of language. By way of offering such re-examination, it pres-
ents what, following Stout, the author calls a “modest pragmatist” vision of public mor-
al discourse, engaging with Stout’s descriptive account of how such discourse has func-
tioned in Western societies, but more importantly, taking inspiration from the central
features of Stout’s approach in a normative sense. In this essay, it is argued that such a vi-
sion is persuasive only if certain principles which Stout either affirms or presupposes –
a strong principle of religious freedom, a democratic principle of inclusion and a prin-
ciple to settle disputes discursively and non-violently – are placed in its centre and de-
veloped somewhat further than they have been in Stout’s own work. This is done by us-
ing recent theoretical works in the epistemology of democracy, especially those by Elis-
abeth Anderson and José Medina, in combination with Wittgensteinian-pragmatist phi-
losophy of religious language.
In this essay, however, the above-mentioned theories of political philosophy – Me-
dina’s theory of hermeneutical (in)justice in particular – are applied to the question
which they do not address directly nor pay much attention to: how can and should dif-
ferent religious languages be included in public moral deliberation? The result is, as
the author argues, a new and stronger variant of the modest pragmatist vision of pub-
lic moral discourse and a renewed argument for the secularity of such discourse: public
moral discourse should normally be (qualifiedly) secular even in societies in which the
majority of citizens are Christian, because such secularity is the most democratic way
to proceed and enables the fairest kind of respect for religious freedom. But secularity
here does not mean a “decrease in faith” among the members of society, nor necessari-
ly a falling attendance at the houses of worship and other religious practices, but rath-
er “the fact that participants in a given discursive practice are not in a position to take
416
žaju, da bi lahko privzeli kot samoumevno, da imajo njihovi sogovorniki iste religiozne
predpostavke kot oni« (Stout 2004, 97).
Ključne besede: pragmatizem, religija, sekularizem, verska svoboda, etika
Religious Moral Languages, Secularity, and Hermeneutical Injustice
Jeffrey Stout’s “modest pragmatism”, as a philosophical approach to public moral
discourse in a religiously plural society, has received a mixed response from the opposite
sides of the secularism debate. On the one hand, influential theologians and communi-
tarian thinkers (e.g. Stanley Hauerwas) have claimed that Stout concedes too much to
the secularists. On the other hand, secularists (e.g. Richard Rorty) have found Stout’s
inclusive approach towards religious reasonings in public discourse all too theological.
This essay is based on the conviction that Stout’s attempt at mediating between the
political theology of Christian communitarians and the liberal visions of public dis-
course – say, versions by Rorty, Habermas and Rawls, respectively – deserves a re-exam-
ination and further analysis in the light of recent work in epistemology of democracy
and pragmatist philosophy of language. By way of offering such re-examination, it pres-
ents what, following Stout, the author calls a “modest pragmatist” vision of public mor-
al discourse, engaging with Stout’s descriptive account of how such discourse has func-
tioned in Western societies, but more importantly, taking inspiration from the central
features of Stout’s approach in a normative sense. In this essay, it is argued that such a vi-
sion is persuasive only if certain principles which Stout either affirms or presupposes –
a strong principle of religious freedom, a democratic principle of inclusion and a prin-
ciple to settle disputes discursively and non-violently – are placed in its centre and de-
veloped somewhat further than they have been in Stout’s own work. This is done by us-
ing recent theoretical works in the epistemology of democracy, especially those by Elis-
abeth Anderson and José Medina, in combination with Wittgensteinian-pragmatist phi-
losophy of religious language.
In this essay, however, the above-mentioned theories of political philosophy – Me-
dina’s theory of hermeneutical (in)justice in particular – are applied to the question
which they do not address directly nor pay much attention to: how can and should dif-
ferent religious languages be included in public moral deliberation? The result is, as
the author argues, a new and stronger variant of the modest pragmatist vision of pub-
lic moral discourse and a renewed argument for the secularity of such discourse: public
moral discourse should normally be (qualifiedly) secular even in societies in which the
majority of citizens are Christian, because such secularity is the most democratic way
to proceed and enables the fairest kind of respect for religious freedom. But secularity
here does not mean a “decrease in faith” among the members of society, nor necessari-
ly a falling attendance at the houses of worship and other religious practices, but rath-
er “the fact that participants in a given discursive practice are not in a position to take
416
