Overview of Episode #240 — Varieties of Religion Today (Charles Taylor)
Host Stephen West summarizes and interprets Charles Taylor’s book Varieties of Religion Today (2002), framing it as a corrective and expansion of William James’s famous account in The Varieties of Religious Experience. West contrasts James’s emphasis on personal, interior religious experience with Taylor’s broader sociological and historical picture of how religion functions — showing how the role of religion has shifted over time and why modern people face unique spiritual problems (fragile belief, consumerized spirituality, and loss of community).
Main themes and thesis
- William James emphasized religion as primarily a personal, phenomenological experience of the transcendent. That account shaped much modern thinking about religion (e.g., “spiritual but not religious”).
- Charles Taylor agrees James captured an important modern phenomenon (the “cusp” between belief and unbelief) but argues James’s view is too narrow: it neglects the communal, institutional, and sociological roles religion has historically played.
- Taylor traces three historical “modes” of religion (paleo‑, neo‑, and post‑Durkheim) to show how religion’s social function has changed and why that matters for how people form beliefs and moral identities today.
- Modernity produces expressive individualism and pluralism that make belief fragile: people oscillate between transcendence and eminence, and often settle for shallow, individualized spiritual substitutes.
Key points and takeaways
- James’s “religion is an interior experience” thesis explains many contemporary attitudes but misses religion’s social and binding functions.
- Emile Durkheim’s sociological insight: religion creates social solidarity — shared meanings, rituals, and moral accountability — which Taylor sees as essential for robust religious life.
- Taylor’s three historical forms:
- Paleo‑Durkheim: religion saturates social life (marriage, education, law tied to religion). Religious membership often required.
- Neo‑Durkheim: religion still unifies society broadly (public symbols like “In God We Trust”), but participation becomes optional.
- Post‑Durkheim: religion becomes a private, elective consumer choice in many places (expressive individualism).
- Modern “open” vs “closed” stances (Taylor borrowing James): closed stance rejects transcendence on principle (the “agnostic veto”); open stance allows exploration of transcendent claims, possibly justified pragmatically by personal orientation.
- “Knowledge by participation”: some forms of understanding (trust, religious experience) require active engagement and commitment; you can’t fully test them from a detached, skeptical posture.
- Consumerized spirituality (apps, yoga, weekend retreats) often functions as a cheap substitute for disciplined communal practices and can leave people with superficial spiritual lives.
- Structural pluralism: modern exposure to diverse, respected worldviews (religious and secular) makes belief/unbelief more fragile and prone to oscillation — James as “philosopher of the cusp.”
- Consequences: without committed communities and disciplines, both religious and secular moral projects risk becoming self‑referential, accommodating, and shallow.
Notable quotes and formulations
- “Religion is something that goes on in the heart of an individual.” — paraphrase of William James’s position described by West.
- James’s pragmatic move: our felt attraction to transcendence can be a reason to explore religion.
- Taylor: “James is our great philosopher of the cusp. He tells us more than anyone else about what it's like to stand in that open space and feel the winds pulling you now here, now there.”
- “Agnostic veto” — the modern tendency to rule out transcendence on principle.
Examples West/Taylor use to clarify ideas
- Trust as knowledge-by-participation: you can only know someone’s trustworthiness by trusting them.
- Medieval Dominican monk: questions of meaning don’t have the same existential force in a culture saturated with cosmic meaning.
- Modern “spiritual but not religious,” weekly-only churchgoers, meditation apps, yoga classes: modern alternatives that often lack communal cost, discipline, and accountability.
Problems Taylor thinks are uniquely modern
- Loss of integrated religious structures that once made transcendence socially obvious and persuasive.
- Spiritual consumerism: assembling a personalized spirituality that’s easy, comfortable, and often thin.
- Fragility of belief because of pluralism: seeing admirable, meaningful lives lived with contrary metaphysical commitments undermines certainty on either side.
- Cross-pressures: continual oscillation between belief and unbelief (“the cusp”) that prevents deep commitment and thus prevents the compensating benefits of committed communal practice.
Practical implications and recommendations (non-prescriptive guidance from Taylor’s analysis)
- Be aware of modern traps: personal comfort, easy substitutes, and self-authorization can undermine moral and spiritual growth.
- Choose a path that genuinely challenges you (religious or secular) and is aimed beyond mere self-expression.
- Find and stick with a community that holds you accountable — sustained commitment and shared disciplines are necessary to develop deeper knowledge-by-participation.
- Resist treating religion purely as an individual aesthetic or consumer preference; investigate the social goods that communal practices provide.
Questions for reflection (to apply the episode’s insights)
- Do I treat religion/spirituality as primarily a private feeling or as a social practice that shapes action and accountability?
- Where in my life do I rely on “knowledge by participation” (trust, discipline, ritual)? Am I giving those the commitment they require?
- Am I tempted to settle for easy, consumerized spiritual practices? If so, what would a more demanding, communal practice look like?
- How does exposure to plural worldviews influence my confidence in my own commitments? Does it push me toward deeper inquiry or toward drift?
Conclusion
Stephen West presents Taylor’s book as a diagnostic of modern spiritual life: James captured the inner, experiential dimension well, but Taylor restores the fuller picture by showing how historically embedded, communal structures shaped belief and moral formation. In late modernity, expressive individualism, structural pluralism, and loss of integrated communities create a fragile “cusp” where people oscillate between transcendence and sole reliance on the immanent — producing distinct challenges for anyone sincere about moral or spiritual growth.