Juergen Habermas and Pope John Paul II on faith, reason, and politics in the modern world

Several historical and contemporary figures argue that religion is a symptom of intellectual immaturity. Others claim that today religion ought to have a diminished public role, even as they acknowledge religion's past contributions. A third group argues that religion confers politically useful sensitivities, such as an awareness of dependence and humility, the reasonableness of natural law, and the primacy of the spiritual life; however, these arguments' resonance weakens with increased distance from communitarian political theory, Roman Catholic thought, and Christian anthropological reflection. I construct a dialogue between Karol Wojtyla, who became Pope John Paul II, and Jurgen Habermas, who as a prominent intellectual and theorist advocates a strict methodological atheism. My method puts into play a flesh-and-blood Roman Catholic, as opposed to an abstract Religion, and a flesh-and-blood advocate of postmetaphysical philosophy, as opposed to an abstract Reason. I argue that a dialogue between Wojtyla and Habermas enriches historical and contemporary discussions on faith and reason by illuminating the degree to which a believer and an atheist can share substantive conclusions about key themes within the discourse of modernity. Wojtyla and Habermas (a) value religion's ability to impart requisite philosophical and political contributions, (b) share an integral understanding of "the way the world is," thereby making them allies contra both anti-religion atheists and religious fundamentalists, and (c) ground their social and political critiques on congruent analyses of intersubjectivity. Within their discourse of modernity, Wojtyla and Habermas uphold seven principles related to philosophy's methodological agnosticism, the symbiosis between philosophy and religion, the complementarity of political and cultural solidarity, and the importance of integrating one's religious faith into a constitutional patriotism. They share also practical agreement on the merits and demerits of modernity, such as appreciation for secularization rightly understood and criticism of perfervid instrumental reason. Both possess similar "ontologies," whose elements include community, autonomy, intersubjectivity, creativity, and language. Their practical and ontological agreement extends to the primacy of the human person's autonomy, which itself depends on a healthy intersubjectivity. Each thinker applies an anthropologically informed analysis of intersubjectivity to evaluate the goodness of personal, social, and political relations.