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Caritas in Veritate and Critical Theory: Locating Religion in the Public Sphere

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 January 2013

Erin Brigham
Erin Brigham
Affiliation:
University of San Francisco
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Abstract

This paper explores the debate on the public voice of religion from two perspectives: contemporary critical theory and the Catholic social tradition. Using the recent conversation between Jürgen Habermas and Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) on religion and secularization as a point of entry, I argue that critical theory offers a framework of rationality that promotes dialogue between religious and secular individuals while the Catholic social tradition's principle of subsidiarity provides a practical model for how this dialogue can occur.

Type
Articles
Information
Horizons , Volume 38 , Issue 1 , Spring 2011 , pp. 36 - 53
Copyright
Copyright © The College Theology Society 2011

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References

1 Schuller, Florian, in the foreword to Ratzinger, Joseph (Pope Benedict XVI) and Habermas, Jürgen, The Dialectics of Secularization: On Reason and Religion, ed. Schuller, Florian, trans. McNeil, Brian (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2006), 11Google Scholar.

2 See Habermas, Jürgen, “Religion in the Public Sphere: Cognitive Presuppositions for the ‘Public Use of Reason’ by Religious and Secular Citizens,” in Between Naturalism and Religion, trans. Cronin, Ciarin (Malden, MA: Polity Press, 2008), 114–47Google Scholar.

3 See Habermas, Jürgen, The Future of Human Nature (Malden, MA: Polity Press, 2003)Google Scholar and Benedict, Pope XVI, Encyclical Charity in Truth (Caritas in Veritate) (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2009), §59Google Scholar.

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9 Specifically relevant are the works of Seyla Benhabib and Nancy Fraser, explored later in this article.

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