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WHAT IS FREEDOM? WHY CHRISTIANITY AND THEORETICAL LIBERALISM CANNOT BE RECONCILED
Author(s) -
GROARKE LOUIS
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
the heythrop journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.127
H-Index - 10
eISSN - 1468-2265
pISSN - 0018-1196
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-2265.2006.00287.x
Subject(s) - flourishing , autonomy , christianity , liberalism , philosophy , protestantism , epistemology , sociology , environmental ethics , theology , law , political science , social psychology , politics , psychology
In this paper I argue that a pervasive “religion as tyranny” view has its roots in a philosophical misunderstanding about human freedom. The established liberal view, which is a kind of “empty Protestantism,” conceives of freedom primarily in negative terms as freedom of choice or amoral autonomy. I argue that this approach, which originates in Puritan theology, leads inevitably to a wide‐ranging indifferentism and that indifferentism is incompatible with Christianity. Christians need to elaborate in response a positive definition of freedom as moral autonomy or good rebellion. Insomuch as religion is an essential aspect of human flourishing, it liberates rather than enslaves the individual.