Religion and Violence in a Secular World: Toward a New Political Theology

How are we to think about religion and violence in the contemporary world, especially in the wake of the events of September 11, 2001? In this collection of essays, nearly a dozen scholars, including some of the leading voices in the field of academic religious thought, offer a theoretical and theological response to the 9/11 attacks as well as a broader and more interdisciplinary reflection on the issues surrounding religion and violence, politics and terrorism, in the world today. Drawing on Continental philosophy as a methodology, the contributors provide insights from and implications for the Western monotheistic traditions of Judaism and Christianity and their engagement with the secular world. Here, religion and secularity are understood not in opposition to one another but rather in interrelationship, religion being seen as both implicated in and providing resources for the overcoming of violence. Raising questions that are timely as well as urgent, Religion and Violence in a Secular World eschews easy solutions in an effort to foster critical and constructive attempts to understand these complex and ambivalent phenomena.

Contributors: John D. Caputo (Syracuse Universty) * Clayton Crockett (University of Central Arkansas) * James J. DiCenso (University of Toronto) * Martin Kavka (Florida State University) * Richard Kearney (Boston College) * Eleanor Pontoriero (University of Toronto) * B. Keith Putt (Samford University) * Carl A. Raschke (University of Denver) * Jeffrey W. Robbins (Lebanon Valley College) * Noëlle Vahanian (Lebanon Valley College) * Edith Wyschogrod (Rice University)