Taking Rites Seriously: Law, Politics, and the Reasonableness of Faith

by Francis J. Beckwith

Taking Rites Seriously is about how religious beliefs and religious believers are assessed by judges and legal scholars and are sometimes mischaracterized and misunderstood by those who are critical of the influence of religion in politics or in the formation of law. Covering three general topics – reason and motive, dignity and personhood, nature and sex – philosopher and legal theorist Francis J. Beckwith carefully addresses several contentious legal and cultural questions over which religious and non-religious citizens often the rationality of religious belief, religiously motivated legislation, human dignity in bioethics, abortion and embryonic stem cell research, reproductive rights and religious liberty, evolutionary theory, and the nature of marriage. In the process, he responds to some well-known critics of public faith – including Brian Leiter, Steven Pinker, Suzanna Sherry, Ronald Dworkin, John Rawls, and Richard Dawkins – as well as to some religiously conservative critics of secularism such as the advocates for intelligent design

Genres: Politics, Religion, Catholic, Nonfiction

240 pages, Paperback

First published October 31, 2015

About the author

Francis J. Beckwith is Professor of Philosophy & Church-State Studies at Baylor University, where he also serves as Associate Director of the Graduate Program in Philosophy and Co-Director of the Program on Philosophical Studies of Religion in Baylor’s Institute for Studies of Religion (ISR). With his appointment in the Department of Philosophy, he also teaches courses in the Departments of Political Science and Religion as well as the J. M. Dawson Institute of Church-State Studies, where he served as its Associate Director from July 2003 until January 2007.

Born in 1960 in New York City, Professor Beckwith grew up in Las Vegas, Nevada, the eldest of the four children of Harold (“Pat”) and Elizabeth Beckwith. He graduated in 1974 from St. Viator’s Elementary School and in 1978 from Bishop Gorman High School, where he was a three-sport letterman and a member of the 1978 Nevada State AAA Basketball Championship Team.

In 2008-09 he served on the faculty of the University of Notre Dame as the Mary Ann Remick Senior Visiting Fellow in Notre Dame’s Center for Ethics & Culture. A 2002-03 Research Fellow in the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions in the Department of Politics at Princeton University, Professor Beckwith currently serves as a member of Princeton’s James Madison Society. He has also held full-time faculty appointments at Trinity International University (1997-2002), Whittier College (1996-97), and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (1989-96).

A graduate of Fordham University (Ph.D. and M.A. in philosophy), he also holds the Master of Juridical Studies (M.J.S.) degree from the Washington University School of Law in St. Louis, where he won a CALI Award for Academic Excellence in Reproductive Control Seminar.

He has served on the executive committees of both the Society of Christian Philosophers (1999-2002) and the Evangelical Philosophical Society (1998-2003) as well as on the national board of the University Faculty for Life (1999-present). The 57th President of the Evangelical Theological Society (November 2006-May 2007) , Professor Beckwith served from 2005 through 2008 as a member of the American Philosophical Association’s Committee on Philosophy and Law. In January 2008 he was selected as the 2007 Person of the Year by Inside the Vatican Magazine.

Reviews

[Nathan Douthit · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was extremely helpful for me. The discussions on human dignity and sexuality were especially interesting. Anyone who wants to understand more about natural law and how religious beliefs can be considered reasonable ought to read it.

[Mike Fendrich · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beckwith introduces the book with an incident that happened to him while giving a lecture at a Texas university on intelligent design. One of the science professors commented (with the apparent intent t dismiss his argument) the his lecture was based on "religious" arguments. Beckwith responded with relief as he thought the professor was going to say they were "bad" arguments. The theme of this book is that by putting the adjective religious in front of the form of discussion, the logic, arguments and comments can be summilarily dismissed. This book is helpful to understand the battle is not faith versus reason, but rather reasoning from differently informed perspectives. A heady read, but one that is certainly worth working through.

[Eduardo Garcia-Gaspar · Rating 4 out of 5]

El subtítulo del libro lo describe bien. La obra es una exploración de temas estadounidenses que relacionan a la ley y a la política con la religión. Aunque los detalles específicos se refieren a la experiencia de los EEUU, la esencia de los argumentos es universal.
Su lectura es pesada y tediosa, y el estar llena de acrónimos no la facilita. Sin embargo, a pesar de ello, se encuentran ideas y razonamientos llenos de talento. En fin, recomendable ppara el lector con real interés en el tema.

[John Wilson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Started reading Beckwith in the early 90's. His insight, acumen and wisdom are a blessing to withhold.