Christentum und »postsäkulare« Gesellschaft. Theologische Anmerkungen zu einer aktuellen Debatte

Against the backdrop of his concept of a post-secular society, this essay deals with the relationship between religion and reason in the works of Jürgen Habermas. What becomes apparent is an irritating degree of ambivalence. On the one hand, religion can be viewed as providing an essential antidote to a moral defeatism. On the other hand, religion can only fulfill this function if it is seen as the cognitively unacceptable »other« side of reason. In the background, the essay argues, lurk the problems accompanied by the conceptual scheme of secularization. From this point of view, religion cannot be perceived as being anything other than an irritating »foreign body« in the modern world.