Rudenstine Revisited

I agree with Rick's observation that there are more fundamental problems with Dean Rudenstine's argument than his failure to make room for us progressive Catholic types. The first problem is one of crude epistemology -- the kind of bald antithesis between faith and reason that fails to take into account a millenium or so of exploration of the relationship between fides et ratio. The second is apparent unfamiliarity with the complex and deeply nuanced debates over the role of religion and faith-based discourse in a liberal democracy that Mike Perry and others have advanced so constructively. The third is the failure to recognize that limitations on reasoned debate in higher education and legal education can come just as easily from the enshrining of secular shibboleths as non-debatable absolutes (as Rick suggests). The fourth is related to what I mentioned in my first post -- a truly simplistic misunderstanding of what faith means. And I do agree with Rick's last point. There would be no place in Dean Rudenstine's law school universe for what we are trying to do here -- understand the implications of Catholic faith for our understanding of the law. That pursuit neither denigrates reason nor ignores "evidence;" it engages with different traditions, and does not seek to silence them; and it insists upon our obligation to pursue truth in the face of the value skepticism and neutrality that has become the official ideology of the legal profession and academy. I hope that Brian Leiter is right in asserting that I have mischaracterized Dean Rudenstine's position, but I have my doubts. His rhetoric is at least agressive, and should not go unchallenged.

--Mark