Pragmatism and Religion

Book excerpt: This distinctive collection of classical and contemporary readings comes at a time when pragmatism is undergoing a renaissance across a spectrum of disciplines. Pragmatism and Religion addresses an important but overlooked issue: whether or not the deep passions and commitments of American pragmatism's central figures are independent of Western religious traditions. The first of the book's three sections samples pragmatism's religious roots. "Classical Sources" includes works by John Winthrop, Jonathan Edwards, Henry David Thoreau, and Ralph Waldo Emerson, as well as Charles Sanders Peirce's "Evolutionary Love," William James's "Philosophy" (chapter 18 of The Varieties of Religious Experience), and selections by John Dewey, W. E. B. Du Bois, John McDermott, and Richard Rorty. Part 2, "Contemporary Essays on the American Tradition of Religious Thought," features Richard Bernstein's "Pragmatism's Common Faith," Stuart Rosenbaum's "Morality and Religion," and Robert Westbrook's "Uncommon Faith," among others. Part 3, "Theism, Secularism, and Religion: Seeking a Common Faith" includes Raymond D. Boisvert's "What Is Religion?" Sandra B. Rosenthal's "Spirituality and the Spirit of American Pragmatism," Carl Vaught's "Dewey's Conception of the Religious Dimension of Experience," and Steven C. Rockefeller's "Faith and Ethics in an Interdependent World," among others. Stuart Rosenbaum's contemporary contributors are among the best in the fields of pragmatism and pragmatism in religion. A unique resource, Pragmatism and Religion will serve students of religion, history, and philosophy, as well as those in interdisciplinary core courses.