Which of the following statements is true about the liberals in the 19th/20th century? i) They favoured state religions. ii) They did not favour freedom of religion. iii) They wanted a nation based on religion. iv) They wanted a nation which tolerated all religions.
Answers
Religious liberalism is a conception of religion (or of a particular religion) which emphasizes personal and group liberty[1] and rationality.[2] It is an attitude towards one's own religion (as opposed to criticism of religion from a secular position, and as opposed to criticism of a religion other than one's own) which contrasts with a traditionalist or orthodox approach, and it is directly opposed by trends of religious fundamentalism. It is related to religious liberty, which is the tolerance of different religious beliefs and practices, but not all promoters of religious liberty are in favor of religious liberalism, and vice versa.
n the context of religious liberalism, liberalism conveys the sense of classical liberalism as it developed in the Age of Enlightenment, which forms the starting point of both religious and political liberalism; but religious liberalism does not necessarily coincide with all meanings of liberalism in political philosophy. For example, an empirical attempt to show a link between religious liberalism and political liberalism proved inconclusive in a 1973 study in Illinois.[4]
Usage of the term liberal in the context of religious philosophy appeared as early as the mid-19th century[5] and became established by the first part of the 20th century; for example, in 1936, philosophy professor and Disciples of Christ minister Edward Scribner Ames wrote in his article "Liberalism in Religion":[6]
The term "liberalism" seems to be developing a religious usage which gives it growing significance. It is more sharply contrasted with fundamentalism, and signifies a far deeper meaning than modernism. Fundamentalism describes a relatively uncritical attitude. In it custom, traditionalism, and authoritarianism are dominant. [...] There is no doubt that the loss of the traditional faith has left many people confused and rudderless, and they are finding that there is no adequate satisfaction in mere excitement or in flight from their finer ideals. They crave a sense of deeper meaning and direction for their life. Religious liberalism, not as a cult but as an attitude and method, turns to the living realities in the actual tasks of building more significant individual and collective human life.
Religious traditionalists, who reject the idea that tenets of modernity should have any impact on religious tradition, challenge the concept of religious liberalism.[citation needed] Secularists, who reject the idea that implementation of rationalistic or critical thought leaves any room for religion altogether, likewise dispute religious liberalism.[citation needed]
"Liberal Christianity" is an umbrella term for certain developments in Christian theology and culture since the Enlightenment of the late 18th century. It has become mostly mainstream within the major Christian denominations in the Western world, but is opposed by a movement of Christian fundamentalism which developed in response to these trends, and by Evangelicalism generally. It also contrasts with conservative forms of Christianity outside the Western world and outside the reach of Enlightenment philosophy and modernism, mostly within Eastern Christianity.[citation needed]
The Catholic Church in particular has a long tradition of controversy regarding questions of religious liberalism. Cardinal John Henry Newman (1801–1890), for example, was considered to be moderately liberal by 19th-century standards because he was critical of papal infallibility, but he explicitly opposed "liberalism in religion" because he argued it would lead to complete relativism.[7]
The conservative Presbyterian biblical scholar J. Gresham Machen criticized what he termed "naturalistic liberalism" in his 1923 book, Christianity and Liberalism, in which he intended to show that "despite the liberal use of traditional phraseology modern liberalism not only is a different religion from Christianity but belongs in a totally different class of religions".[8] The Anglican Christian apologist C. S. Lewis voiced a similar view in the mid-20th century, arguing that "theology of the liberal type" amounted to a complete re-invention of Christianity and a rejection of Christianity as understood by its own founders.[9]
German-Jewish religious reformers began to incorporate critical thought and humanist ideas into Judaism from the early 19th century.[citation needed] This resulted in the creation of various non-Orthodox denominations, from the moderately liberal Conservative Judaism to very liberal Reform Judaism. The moderate wing of Modern Orthodox Judaism, especially Open Orthodoxy, espouses a similar approach.