In a comment to this post, Eric makes the valuable point that “reason” is not a univocal term. He points out that what some theologians are up to is trying to recover a richer notion of what reason is. He refers to Benedict XVI’s Regensburg Address which called for a kind of “re-Hellenization” of our understanding of what reason does in contrast to the often dessicated account of reason offered by much modern (and post-modern) thought.

Now, I think this is all to the good. There definitely is a strain in post-Enlightenment thought that has reduced reason to instrumental or scientific rationality, banishing everything else, such as religious and moral truth, to the realm of the subjective.

However we understand reason though, we need to be careful not to smuggle our preferred conclusions into our definition of rationality. For instance, should reason be defined as that which, when rightly used, leads us to God? This makes atheists irrational by definition, but that sounds like a word game or winning by definition. It’s more charitable to admit that different people, employing their powers of reason to the best of their ability, can come to different conclusions about God’s existence and other important questions of existence.

I agree that there is a problem with certain modernist accounts of rationality to the extent that they restrict the category of knowledge to beliefs supported by a certain kind of evidence or method of inquiry – that appropriate to scientific work. This excludes certain modes of knowing – personal, experiential, intuitive, even mystical – a priori. A more comprehensive view of reason would see these as complementary ways of knowing, not inferior ones. But by their very nature these modes of knowing aren’t publicly demonstrative or easily verified intersubjectively. So, as a basis for deliberating about the common good they have problems.

The challenge, if a pluralistic society is to find some kind of modus vivendi, is to locate an overlapping consensus on the conditions for a relatively decent social order. To say that Christians should be in the public sphere “as Christians,” as Stanley Hauerwas likes to say, leaves unclear what it means for them to be there as Christians alongside non-Christians. Should Christians seek to embody their convictions about what’s right in the law, to bring it into conformity with God’s law, as Mike Huckabee says? Or should they take a strict policy of non-involvement with the structures of government?

I sometimes think that this is more of a theoretical problem than a practical one. Personally, I often find I have more in common politically with my some of my secular friends than many of my co-religionists. Indeed, I have little difficulty finding common ground with them on a whole host of issues. Does this mean that my political views are insufficiently informed by my religion? Maybe. But it could also be that religious belief under-determines political belief by its very nature. After all, I’m hardly the first person to observe that the line from Christian doctrine and moral principles to concrete policy prescriptions is hardly a short or straight one.

This brings up another, often unappreciated, fact: we talk all too easily about “the” Christian tradition or “the” Christian narrative. But there is no single, coherent, uncontested Christian narrative. The Christian tradition is an ongoing conversation or argument, sometimes a bloody one. In a very important sense it’s highly misleading to think in terms of “Christians” being aligned with or in conflict with “non-Christians” or “secularism.” There simply is no unified Christian community or perspective on society. This may be a tragedy or a blessing depending on your point of view, but it’s a fact that’s unlikely to change anytime soon.

I guess what I’m saying is that however we understand reason, it’s not going to guarantee unanimity on the ordering of our public life. In fact, one of the most important conditions of a peaceful and liberal society is that those in the minority – who, after the votes are counted, still dissent – can count on their rights being respected and that unanimous agreement isn’t a necessary condition for social peace. The same need is present in the church, where we see that even shared theological premises don’t automatically generate agreement on contentious issues.

I’m not pretending to have resolved the issue: it’s an open question whether we can continue to get along and seek the common good while maintaining divergent conceptions of the good. But this may be a problem that’s never “solved” once and for all – it may not be a theoretical solution that we need, but the virtues of civility, charity, and humility required to travel alongside those very different from ourselves.