Maverick Philosopher

Footnotes to Plato from the foothills of the Superstition Mountains

Category: Religion

  • A. E. Taylor on F. H. Bradley on Religion

    Here at Maverick Philosopher: Strictly Philosophical

  • John Hick’s Religious Ambiguity Thesis

    Here at Maverick Philosopher: Strictly Philosophical

  • Could All Paths be Dead Ends?

    I wrote: Reason in the end must confess its own infirmity.  It cannot deliver on its promises. The truth-seeker must explore other avenues.  Religion is one, mysticism is another.  Vito Caiati responds: My concern is as follows: While I agree that “reason in the end must confess its own infirmity,” I am troubled by the…

  • From Religion to Philosophy: A Typology of Motives for Making the Move

    People come to philosophy from various 'places.'  Some come from religion, others from mathematics and the natural sciences, still others from literature and the arts.  There are other termini a quis as well.  In this post I am concerned only with the move from religion to philosophy.  What are the main types of reasons for those who are…

  • Ancora Una Volta: “Reasoned Mysterianism”

    Dr. Vito Caiati writes (minor edits, formatting, and bolding added), I thank you for your online response (Reasoned Mysterianism: A Defense of an Aphoristic Provocation) to my recent email.  In it you offer an impressive, rigorous defense of “reasoned mysterianism” that has impelled me to think more deeply on this subject, so much so, in fact,…

  • A Reasoned Mysterianism? Defense of an Aphoristic Provocation

     This just in from Dr. Vito Caiati: I write because I am confused about yesterday’s short post The Believing Philosopher, in which you state, “The religious belief of a believing philosopher is a reasoned belief, and even if his belief extends to the acceptance of mysteries that to the discursive intellect must appear contradictory, his…

  • The Believing Philosopher

    The religious belief of a believing philosopher is a reasoned belief, and even if his belief extends to the acceptance of mysteries that to the discursive intellect must appear contradictory, his is a reasoned mysterianism.

  • On Opposing a Dangerous Ideology that is also a Religion

    This article by William Kilpatrick bears on my ongoing conversation with a Canadian philosopher about Islam, religious tests, and constitutional interpretation. Last exchange here.  I'll pull a few quotations from Professor Kilpatrick and add some comments. The idea of opposing dangerous ideologies is not foreign to Americans, but the idea of opposing an ideology that…

  • Could a Theist Maintain that Some Lack a Religious Disposition?

    Suppose you believe that man has been created in the image and likeness of God.  Could you, consistently with that belief, hold that only some possess a religious disposition? I have discussed this before, but the question came up again in an e-mail from a reader. I often say things like the following: The religious…

  • More on “No Religious Test”

    A Canadian reader comments and I reply: I've been thinking about the problem of interpreting "no religious test" in light of your post.  It's actually a very difficult problem!  I'm almost convinced the correct response is that, unfortunately, if the Constitution is interpreted correctly then fundamentalist Muslims do indeed have the right to hold public office–given…

  • “No Religious Test”

     In Article VI of the U. S. Constitution we read: . . . no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States. Does it follow that the U. S. Constitution should be so interpreted as to allow a Muslim citizen who supports sharia (Islamic…

  • On ‘Spirituality’

    The trendy embrace the term 'spirituality' but shun its close cousin, ‘religion.’ I had a politically correct Jewish professor in my kitchen a while back whose husband had converted from Roman Catholicism to Judaism. I asked her why he had changed his religion. She objected to the term ‘religion,’ explaining that his change was a…

  • Why Did Thomas Aquinas Leave his Summa Theologiae Unfinished?

    Our frenetic and hyperkinetic way of life these days makes it difficult to take seriously religion and what is essential to it, namely, the belief in what William James calls an Unseen Order. Our communications technology in particular is binding us ever tighter within the human horizon so much so that the sense of Transcendence…

  • Religion

    Religion is not an expression of weakness  but an acknowledgment of it.

  • Is a Thinking Person’s Afterlife Conceivable?

    A repost from over five years ago. Reposts are the reruns of the blogosphere. You don't watch a Twilight Zone or Seinfeld episode only once, do you?  No you don't. The savoring of the riches therein contained requires many viewings. Same with what follows, mutatis mutandis.  Resurrected due to its relevance to a recent thread…