(Download) "Christianity, Enlightenment Liberalism, And the Quest for Freedom (Viewpoint Essay)" by Modern Age # Book PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: Christianity, Enlightenment Liberalism, And the Quest for Freedom (Viewpoint Essay)
- Author : Modern Age
- Release Date : January 22, 2006
- Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines,Books,Professional & Technical,Education,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 204 KB
Description
"THE ERA WE CALL MODERN TIMES," Joseph Ratzinger has written, "has been determined from the beginning by the theme of freedom." Indeed, it is precisely "the striving for new forms of freedom" that defines modernity as a distinct historical epoch. (3) The modern quest for freedom, in turn, is closely connected with the "turn to the human," the exaltation of the worth and dignity of the human person that is among the defining features of modern culture. If the ideas of freedom and human dignity are not discoveries of the modern world, it is nevertheless undeniable that with the rise of modernity, they come to assume a new importance and new prominence. Politically, this quest finds expression in the ideal of "democracy." Institutionally, this means a system of government in which the state is limited in its scope, subject in its operations to the rule of law, and responsible to those it governs, and which incorporates in its public law guarantees of the rights of individuals and social groups. Yet, for "modern peoples," as Jacques Maritain observes, "the word democracy ... has a wider meaning than in the classical treatises on the science of government" designating not just a form of government but "first and foremost a general philosophy of human and social life." (4) At the heart of this philosophy is an affirmation of the dignity and the inalienable rights of the human person; and an insistence that social and political life must advance the good of the whole community and not just some privileged segment of it.