Comments on Religious Freedom

Extract

Here, at the very beginning of our conference, it may be useful for me to restate summarily some of the main themes in The Meaning of Religious Freedom as I understand them. Professor Gamwell begins with what he calls “the modern political problematic.” Regarded from a religious point of view, the problematic is how a religious person (who, in accordance with the author's definition of religion as an answer to “the comprehensive question,” might be a systematic atheist) can logically avoid either denying the political relevance of his faith and spurning public debate; or else entering into public debate, but insisting without argument on the truth of that faith and in that way seeking, at least implicitly, its official establishment. Regarded from a political point of view, the problematic is: how can religious people, with their nonrational faiths, be admitted into the political realm—a realm open to all regardless of diverse faiths and therefore necessarily based on the rational powers we all have in common—without fatally compromising the principled openness of public life? It is a crucial premise of Professor Gamwell's argument that a mere modus vivendi cannot be an adequate answer to this problematic; only a theory of justice will suffice.