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Human Rights and Political Possibility: A Religious Inquiry†

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 April 2015

Douglas Sturm
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Extract

More than any of you can possibly imagine, I am overwhelmed by this occasion. Yet I would not linger on my inner feelings about the honor you have so graciously provided me. I would instead use these precious moments to reflect with you about a question of immense import that presses upon us.

As we ponder the question, which I shall state in a moment, I would have us keep in mind two things, a conviction and a commemoration. The conviction was declared by Richard L. Rubenstein in his disturbing book, The Age of Triage, a study of genocide from the 16th century to the present. He affirms “that no theological enterprise, that is, no consideration of the ultimate values that move men and women, can be adequate to its task if it ignores critical political and social theory.”

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Law and Religion , Volume 13 , Issue 1 , 1996 , pp. 43 - 56
Copyright
Copyright © Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University 1987

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Footnotes

†

This article has been reprinted with permission from Criterion (Winter 1989).

References

1. Rubenstein, Richard L., The Age of Triage: Fear and Hope in an Over-crowded World (Beacon Press, 1983)Google Scholar.

2. Id at v.

3. Whitehead, Alfred North, Adventures of Ideas 191 (Macmillan, 1933)Google Scholar.

4. Id at 42.

5. Id.

6. Holland, Joe and Henriot, Peter, Social Analysis: Linking Faith and Justice xi–xiii (Orbis, 1983)Google Scholar.

7. Drinnon, Richard, Facing West: The Metaphysics of Indian-hating and Empirebuilding (U Minnesota Press, 1980)Google Scholar.

8. Id at 465.

9. King, Martin Luther Jr., Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community? 68 (Beacon Press 1967)Google Scholar.

10. Rubenstein, , The Age of Triage 1–33Google Scholar (cited in note 1).

11. MacIntyre, Alasdair, After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory 6 (U of Notre Dame Press, 1981)Google Scholar.

12. Id.

13. Id at 69.

14. Id at 263.

15. Id at 221.

16. Hocking, William E., The Coming World Civilization 21–42 (Harper, 1956)Google Scholar.

17. Id at 19 (italics removed).

18. Id at 29.

19. Meland, Bernard, Faith and Culture 111–12 (S Illinois U Press, 1953)Google Scholar.

20. Meland, Bernard, The Realities of Faith: The Revolution in Cultural Forms 193 (Oxford U Press, 1962)Google Scholar.

21. Shue, Henry, Basic Rights: Subsistence, Affluence, and U.S. Foreign Policy 13 (Princeton U Press, 1980)Google Scholar.

22. Id at 18.

23. Id at 19.

24. Whitehead, , Adventures of Ideas 66Google Scholar (cited in note 3).

25. Rubenstein, , The Age of Triage at 240Google Scholar (cited in note 1).