Habermas and Religion

"This groundbreaking book contains a number of penetrating and insightful essays on Habermas's recent work, and on the meaning of the secular and of postsecularism. It will undoubtedly take the debate on all these issues to a much more rigorous and fruitful level. A stellar collection, with papers of a very high quality."
Charles Taylor, Professor Emeritus, McGill University

"In 2001, shortly after 9/11, Jürgen Habermas's address 'Faith and Religion' attracted a great deal of attention. Until that time the topic of religion had not been a major concern in Habermas’s extensive oeuvre but he now began to speak of a postsecular age in which religion becomes a major topic in rethinking modernity and in meeting the challenge of religion in public life. This collection includes many of his most sophisticated interpreters and critics and Habermas, in his characteristic dialogical spirit, replies to each of his critics. Anyone seriously interested in the current state of the discussion about religion and public life will find this collection essential reading."
Richard J. Bernstein, New School for Social Research

"Jürgen Habermas has sometimes been called the pope of European secularism, but in recent years he has written frequently and appreciatively about religion without giving up his own position. This volume collects a number of very lively responses to these writings, many of them challenging Habermas in fairly sharp ways, and coming from those close to him, like Thomas McCarthy, and far from him, like John Milbank. The book ends with Habermas’s generous but firm response to his critics: altogether a most readable and thought-provoking book."
Robert Bellah, Professor Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley