Christianity, Truth, and Weakening Faith

March 1, 2010
Vattimo and Girard are perhaps not household names in the United States but are well-known philosophers in Europe: Vattimo, a Catholic nihilist and a clever deployer of the ideas of Martin Heidegger; Girard, admired author of such books as "Violence and the Sacred". Both men, from varying viewpoints, see Christianity as a crucial influence on world culture. This short volume is a compilation of conversations between the two held between 1996 and 2006, as well as essays written by each between 1999 and the present. Bracing and even daunting in its intellectual adventurousness, the book shows two very different minds with Christianity as "the religion of exit from religion" and one of the most important sources of democracy, individualism, and the free marketsome of the very forces that have weakened its grip on contemporary society. VERDICT Rich, difficult, fascinating, and provocative reading on Christianity and culture from two of the new Europe's leading eggheads.

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