Over the last few weeks on Thursday nights, we've been discussing Reinhold Niebuhr's Moral Man and Immoral Society. For any of you who would like to catch up on past conversations, here's the ground we've covered so far.
Book Club Introduction by FrankCornish
Introduction by FrankCornish
Chapter One, Man and Society: The Art of Living Together by NLinStPaul
Chapter Two, The Rational Resources of the Individual for Social Living by dirkster42
Tonight we'll discuss Chapter Three: The Religious Resources of the Individual for Social Living.
At the outset, I'd like to say that when FrankCornish, dirkster42, and I divided up the chapters for this discussion, I looked at my schedule more than the content. That was perhaps a mistake. As someone who was raised in rightwing Christian fundamentalism and has since become an agnostic as far as religion is concerned, I feel woefully inadequate to introduce the discussion of this particular chapter.
Niebuhr comes from a totally different religious tradition than I am familiar with and I must admit that my head was spinning as I tried to wrap my mind around his thoughts about the question of the adequacy of religion to address the social ills faced by society. I found myself arguing with him in my head about my own conclusions and don't want to inject those judgements into this introduction of what Niebuhr wrote. So I'll ask for your forbearance and hope that my partners in this endeavor will come to my aid in the comments.
With that out of the way, I'll say that, just as Niebuhr in Chapter Two made the case for the limits of rationality to produce a moral society, in this chapter he makes the same case for religion. But since he is writing from the Christian tradition, it strikes me as important to note that this is his frame of reference. In a broad sense, I see that while the argument he's making could apply to all monotheistic religions (or those rooted in the Abrahamic tradition), he really doesn't address whether or not a similar case could be made for other religious traditions that are not based on a singular deity as the source of morality. It strikes me that a discussion of those possibilities and limits might be interesting as well.
Most of Niebuhr's concerns about the adequacy of religion to address the moral challenges of society come from his view of the distance between what religion identifies as moral and the realities of the world in which we live.
Wherever religion concerns itself with the problems of society, it always gives birth to some kind of millennial hope, from the perspective of which present social realities are convicted of inadequacy, and courage is maintained to continue in the effort to redeem society of injustice. (page 61)
Nevertheless the tendency of religion to obscure the shades and shadows of moral life, by painting only the contrast between the white radiance of divine holiness and the darkness of the world, remains a permanent characteristic of the religious life. (page 69)
In looking at the history of the early Christian church, Niebuhr sees a withdrawal from the social ills of the day.
The early church was defeatist in its attitude toward the "world," regarding the world as doomed and expressing its optimism in its millennial hopes<...> Slavery, injustice, inequality of wealth, war, these all were accepted as ordained by the "natural law" which God had devised for man's sinful state<...> For the church, both Catholic and Protestant, the law of love was interpreted religiously rather than socially. (pages 76-77)
In terms of the Christian tradition of Neibuhr's day, he sees a retreat into sentimentality that springs from the romanticism of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Thus we developed a type of religious idealism, which is saturated with sentimentality. In spite of the disillusionment of the World War, the average liberal Protestant Christian is still convinced that the kingdom of God is gradually approaching, <...> that the wealthy will be persuaded to dedicate their power and privilege to the common good and that they are doing so in increasing numbers, that the conversion of individuals is the only safe method of solving the social problem, and that such ethical weaknesses as religion still betrays are due to the theological obscurantism which will be sloughed off by the progress of enlightenment. (pages 79-80)
He then goes on to describe the hypocrisy which results from such sentimentality.
Since liberal Protestantism is, on the whole, the religion of the privileged classes of Western civilisation, it is not surprising that its espousal of the ideal of love, in a civilisation reeking with social injustice, should be cynically judged and convicted of hypocrisy by those in whom bitter social experiences destroy the sentimentalities and illusions of the comfortable. (page 80)
But finally he sees, as with rationality, that religion is a necessary but insufficient component of a just society.
...there must always be a religious element in the hope of a just society. Without the ultra rational hopes and passions of religion no society will ever have the courage to conquer despair and attempt the impossible; for the vision of a just society is an impossible one, which can be approximated only by those who do not regard it as impossible. (page 81)
Next week, FrankCornish will lead the discussion on Chapter Four: The Morality of Nations.