Religious Dynamics

The pluralisation of religion in our world of culture is not merely the result of globalisation. Mass migration too—caused by war, oppression, famine and unemployment—has promoted the spread of different religious movements and groups to northern Europe. What is more, the revolutionary development in information technology has made it easier for people to acquire a deeper knowledge of the different forms and traditions of religion.

One can go further back. The Jewish religion has had a certain, limited, freedom to exist in Sweden since the time of Gustav III at the end of the 18th century. At the end of the 19th century the religious monopoly held by the Swedish church began to become weaker as a result of radical changes in Swedish society. New Christian movements were established both within and outside the state church: the Swedish Missionary Society, the Methodist and Baptist churches, the Evangelical National Missionary Society, the Roman Catholic Church and other so-called Free Church movements. In this way the opportunity to mould a life of Christian faith outside the state church was gradually expanded.

In 1951 the Swedish parliament adopted a law of religious freedom. At least at a legal level, religion in Sweden has subsequently been a question of personal direction and choice. At the same time there were, both within the university world and Swedish cultural debate, critics of religion who, using the tools of analytical philosophy, wished to show the untenable position of Christian doctrines. On the one hand, this critique contributed to an important scrutiny of the nature of Christian religion and its traditional place in Swedish society. On the other hand, the Christian religion was reduced to a collection of simple truths which subsequently could easily be dismissed from a rationalist scientific viewpoint. Within the purview of the new critical reason there was no room for a simple belief in the story of how the universe was created in six days, in New Testament stories about miracles, in the teaching on Heaven and Hell or in religious reflections on morality. A scientific testing of the dogmatists of this kind showed that Christian faith and the church rested on an untenable mythological premise—and should therefore be abandoned. Between belief and knowledge a radical dividing line was drawn about which Ingemar Hedenius reminded all thinking Swedes in his book Tro och vetande (“Belief and knowledge”) from 1949.

As far as the scientific debate in Sweden was concerned, the question of religion was thus finally decided. The fact that the critique of religion and the phenomenology of religion were being developed further outside Sweden beyond single track analytical methods was seldom observed among Swedish thinkers and the powers-that-be in the media. The church remained in Sweden as part of Swedish national life and was generally regarded as a kind of service centre for all kinds of ceremonies of life and death. It was not considered to have any major significance for the uniform post-religious culture which during the second half of the 20th century took the place of the earlier uniform ecclesiastical culture. The fact that the church separated from the state on January 1, 2000 could, therefore, also be regarded as a consequence of scientific evolution. Now Swedish society was also formally free of religion, and could develop on a purely scientific basis.

On January 1, 2001 the new Swedish Research Council was formed, which united different state sponsors of science into one unitary council. I had the privilege of sitting on the humanist–social science section of the council between 2001 and 2003 and was able to experience at close quarters how the government authorities entrusted important decisions for the development of society to this new scientific authority. The question of the conditions and opportunities of embryonic stem cell research in Sweden was decided by this body and not, as in the rest of the world, by the democratically elected representatives of the people. This system worried only a few members of the council. Most considered that a uniform scientific ethos applied in Sweden. For this reason all ethical questions should be treated and decided in a purely scientific manner. The prevalent scientific view was considered to be beyond all criticism.

Instead of confronting the vital ethical conflicts which characterise every pluralist society, they denied the existence of conflicts of this kind in favour of a scientifically directed uniform society. Who criticises the scientific oligarchy and its different interests? Who raises problems concerning the concept of reason used by the priests of science in Sweden?

As we have seen, the pluralising process within Christianity in Sweden has not led to a pluralist social culture. Instead a new uniform culture has been established which more or less officially governs Sweden according to supposed scientific principles, and which acts with scientific authority to determine ethical questions at all levels of social organisation. In this way central discussions about religion, about the conditions of life and death, about morality and about the difference between the law and morality have been thrust aside. Religion has been declared to be private. Its critical and emancipatory potential has been glossed over so that the scientific society is not disturbed by voices which in public wish to discuss where we human beings are going, where we come from, what we consider to be good and evil, what goals we are striving for in our lives, and how pluralist democratic society might be organised today.

The Enlightenment’s challenges to religious convictions and religiously motivated forms of oppression have been important for the development of religion, and have promoted a critique of religion from both within and without. In the same way, I would like to see a systematic critique of the conditions and forms of science and reason in Sweden (and abroad). Only when religion in its different guises and scientific reason have both reached a critical and self-critical level can a profitable interaction begin between these two authorities to the benefit of the development of humanity.

It would be a shame if the return of religion were to be welcomed by the general public in Sweden primarily on the basis of the fact that scientific reason has clearly shown its deficiencies and limitations. Religion should not fill the vacuum of science—just as little as science should compensate for the limitations and fallacious developments of religion. Rather, both reason and religion together and in a mutually critical interplay should contribute to the emancipation of humanity from all forms of oppression.

The philosopher Jürgen Habermas, who for a long time has prided himself on his lack of religious sensibilities, has recently demanded that pressing religious insights into human nature should be included in the public debate, but only after a translation of these insights into a non-religious language. Habermas believes, in other words, that religious insights and convictions important to society should be translatable, so that non-religious individuals can more easily include them in their rationalist worldview. This belief represents, however, a new attempt to reduce religion to the principles of reason and science, even if this attempt seems to be more sympathetically disposed towards religious traditions. Here religion is being used to fill a vacuum, but it is not being respected for what it really is and how it works.

Religion is a dynamic attitude to God, to other people, to the universe and to oneself. A personal relationship can never be reduced to a rationalist calculation. A dynamic relationship, for example a loving relationship, does not merely develop according to predictable premises, but always provides surprises. A loving relationship does not follow scientific maxims and systems. This does not mean, however, that loving relationships cannot be studied in a scientific way. But no science can ever completely understand a loving relationship, because the dynamic in a relationship between individuals always reveals new dimensions of otherness. The experience of the other person’s otherness at the same time provides an experience of one’s own otherness. A real loving relationship—unlike romantic idealisations—always leads to a change in all of the subjects concerned. In the sphere of religion this phenomenon is known as transcendence. Transcendence is, therefore, a gift. It can be received, but it cannot be produced. The experience of transcendence always reveals new sides of the mystery of life, sides which are not accessible within a purely rationalist purview.

Exploring the truth about human existence demands an openness to what the philosopher Paul Ricoeur has called the “manifestation” of truth in the rites, symbols, philosophical traditions, prophetic sources and narratives of religion. The interpretation of the depths of reality presupposes critical and self-critical hermeneutics.

This is where we see the limitations of purely rationalist and value-neutral ethics such as is recommended and pursued in Sweden at the present day. Every ethical judgement presupposes an outlook on life—religious or non-religious. If this outlook on life is based on purely mechanical, rationalist and instrumental calculations, it leads automatically to other ethical judgements and decisions than if it takes into account complex religious experiences and interpretations. This fact has been displaced from the public discussion of morality in Swedish society. Here instead ethics have been subordinated to certain more or less explicit interests, while religion has been relegated to private life.

When embryonic stem cell research was discussed within the Swedish Research Council in 2001, several medical and other members made it clear that the biomedical interest complex was demanding unimpeded access to the embryo for the sake of free research. In public they proclaimed what is more that this research leads to an improvement in therapies for various medical conditions. The argument that it is not so self-evident that one should sacrifice the life of developing embryos in order later, perhaps, to be able to save other people’s lives was rejected as “odd.” An embryo was, according to the research council’s guidelines, instead subordinated to the self-defined needs of science and was considered not to be a developing human life.

This attitude is consistent according to the assumptions of scientific theory that are prevalent in Sweden. But it is not at all self-evident if one regards human life within a greater philosophical or religious purview. Philosophically one may, with Jürgen Habermas, object that research into the embryo that destroys the embryo itself leads to two kinds of human life that are then subordinated to each other: life “A” which already exists (our life) and the life “B” which needs to be cultivated to meet life “A’s” needs (the embryo’s life).

From a Christian perspective one might object that no life should be reduced merely to a needs estimate. But, as the Swedish parliament had interpreted stem cell ethics as a scientific complex of interests, it had already predetermined that an ethical assessment of research of this kind was to be subordinated to purely instrumental needs.

Another example of the dilemma of value-neutral ethics is the discussion on abortion in Sweden. On the one hand, it seems that there is a general consensus that abortion is a right guaranteeing a woman’s rights over her body, therefore abortion is in the service of emancipation. On the other hand, many women demand that their aborted foetus be buried in a dignified manner. This, therefore, expresses a feeling that the foetus is worth more than any other medical waste product. Consequently, it becomes clear that issues concerning the life of the foetus cannot be reduced entirely to questions of female emancipation.

What is more, legal and moral considerations are often confused in debates on abortion, and also in other cases. Despite the fact that I myself, out of religious conviction, consider that abortion is an evil human choice, I participated in a demonstration march for the right to abortion when I lived in Dublin in the 1980s. Why? Because I know that many people did not share my religious views about the sanctity of life. Moreover, complicated situations arise—such as when the health of the mother is in danger, or when she becomes pregnant as a result of rape—then abortion may be the least worst alternative. Law and morality are not the same thing. Even if abortions are legal in Sweden and I myself want this to be the case, I regard an abortion as a moral evil, as it terminates a developing human life with a potential for relationships and love of God, its fellow human beings and itself.

I am amazed that there is often an attempt to create morals through legislation instead of promoting an ongoing debate within society on moral conflicts and possible solutions. A liberal legal system does not exclude an ongoing debate on moral conflicts within a pluralist democratic society. On the contrary, a comprehensive social debate on moral challenges must take into account and benefit from the wide spectrum of religious and non-religious outlooks on life and experiences to be found in Sweden and abroad. A comprehensive social debate of this kind would liberate us from the fallacious notion that laws can replace moral development and from the oppressive idea that Sweden is dominated by a uniform scientific morality. What, then, can religion contribute to a social debate of this kind? Within the different churches and denominations in Sweden different views are held on exegesis, creed and organisation. There is a battle here on what is good and evil and how one can best understand the purport of Christian love. But there is also a common conviction here that God is present as a dynamic force for change in the world. The Christian belief in God as love means that God cannot be defined, but only discovered in a mutual loving relationship which comprises everyone—living and dead. To contemplate and admire the universe as God’s creation does not conflict with a belief in evolutionary theory or other scientific discoveries. Rather, the Jewish, Muslim and Christian beliefs in creation mean that the entire universe stands in a dynamic relationship with God. Through this relationship the universe has a dignity which should be protected against all attempts by human beings to exploit nature for their own egotistical ends.

As we have already seen, science cannot understand a dynamic relationship. It may, admittedly, help in understanding the different components of the relationship, but it cannot understand the entirety of its dynamics. The question of the place of humankind in the universe cannot be answered by science, but requires deeper answers, answers which, in their turn, presuppose a personal and dynamic relationship to the universe. The wisdom of religions cannot, therefore, be translated into rationalist discourses. And it cannot be reduced to the private sphere. Rather it is personal and political. It wants to change the world.

Religion invites you to a life in a relationship, in love and change on the way to the discovery of the mystery of life. This life project opens everyone’s perspective on life anew every day, hopefully in a deeper way, and normally in communion with other fellow travellers on this voyage of discovery. For this reason religiously disposed individuals throughout the ages have been able to say to those curious individuals who wish to understand the secret and aims of religion: come and have a look!

Many people, however, become justifiably frightened when, on closer inspection, they see how even religious people are quite capable of oppressing, manipulating and terrorising other people. Religion is no guarantee against evil, against terror or against oppression. Religion is, and remains, an ambiguous phenomenon. But religion also offers an opportunity for a deeper life and a deeper understanding of and relationship to the mystery and potential of the universe. Religion offers a dynamic relationality which reveals the great nexus between everything and everyone.

But religion exists only in tangible forms—every human being can live as a religious subject who, together with other subjects, organises and experiences their relationships with other people, with God, with the universe and with their own developing self, therefore as a subject that also respects all other individuals as subjects. This involves a protest against all attempts – scientific as well as all others – to reduce human beings to the status of an object. In the best case religion defends the value of a human being as a subject against the objectification of science and society’s instrumentalisation of humankind. Religion can defend the right of a human being to be human. Religion can be a central liberating force in society.

It is clear that Swedish society would change if religions were welcome to participate more actively in building up this country. The uniform scientific morality must, however, first be abandoned in favour of a pluralist ethical debate, in which religious and non-religious worldviews are given a place to contribute with their wisdom, their ethical competence and their tradition of respect for the other and the others, primarily for those who represent a different attitude on social, cultural, political and ethical questions. Mutual respect is a pre-requisite for the functioning of a pluralist democratic society.

A more active participation on the part of religions in Swedish society also requires the involvement by the Swedish parliament in a new Swedish religious policy. Religions have to accept that the state’s authority and organisational function do not merely apply to the defence of freedom of worship, but also to the critical scrutiny of such religious practice that threaten other people’s rights to be religious or non-religious. This means that the Swedish Parliament, the political parties and the government have to take part in the debate about what is good and what is evil in religion.

The Axess theme issue on religion, Swedish Radio’s new programme “The Theology Room” and the burgeoning theological education and research at many places across the country are some of many signs that the return of religion is leading to a deeper social debate and the broadening of the ethical discussion. The emancipatory potential of religion is revealing itself—in Sweden too.

Werner G. Jeanrond is Professor of Divinity at the University of Glasgow.

Translated by Phil Holmes