Rational Theology within Postmetaphysical Thinking? A Catholic Assessment of Habermas' View of Religious Belief. Issue 2 (December 2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Breul, Martin
• Is Part Of: Horizons. Volume 48:Issue 2(2021)
• Page Start: 456
• Page End: 474
• Publication Date: 2021-12
• Subjects: religious epistemology -- postsecularism -- Jürgen Habermas -- postmetaphysical thinking; Theology -- Periodicals; Doctrines -- History -- Periodicals; 230.205
• DOI: 10.1017/hor.2021.62
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0360-9669

Abstract

Abstract : Jürgen Habermas' assessment of the rationality of religious convictions is ambivalent, as it oscillates between a postsecular appropriation of their semantic potentials and a fideistic insistence on their "discursive extraterritoriality." In this article, I argue that Habermas' fideistic portrayal of religious convictions is neither compatible with the overall argumentative architecture of his postsecular paradigm nor a logical consequence of Habermas' philosophical framework in general. Instead, once his fideism is overcome, Habermas' postmetaphysical discourse theory provides valuable resources for contemporary Catholic theology. This article thus offers both a theological assessment of Habermas' view of religious belief and an argument for a Catholic appropriation of Habermas' postmetaphysical thinking.