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Public discussion of religion tends to polarize between two extremes: religious fundamentalism, and the aggressive atheism of such writers as Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens. But much of what people actually believe falls somewhere in between. It is subtler and more tentative. David Cayley explores the work of five thinkers whose recent books have charted new paths for religion.



Part 5: Roger Lundin

In his book A Secular Age, Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor traces changes in religious belief from the late Middle Ages to the present. Taking the year 1500 as a baseline, he argues that at this date belief in God was a given, something obvious and unquestionable. Today religious belief is, in his words, "optional" - a choice - made in the face of a bewildering variety of possibilities. In between lies a journey through doubt - a journey made by an entire civilization but also by each individual who opts for some religious conviction.



Roger Lundin's book Believing Again: Doubt and Faith in a Secular Age follows this journey as it has unfolded in modern literature. Lundin is a literary scholar and professor at Wheaton College in Chicago. He shares his thoughts with David Cayley in the final episode of After Atheism: New Perspectives on God and Religion.





Believing Again: Doubt and Faith in a Secular Age by Roger Lundin is published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.



