Toward a Civil Discourse: Rhetoric and Fundamentalism

Preface

ix While writing this book I was repeatedly reminded of what the postmodern concept of difference actually means in practice. I cannot accept either the principles or the specific teachings of apocalyptist discourse, and the more I study apocalyptism, the more intense becomes my desire not only to dissent from it but to warn others of the ideological dangers it poses to democracy. I raise this point here because my status as an outsider to conservative religious thought brings to the fore the central issues raised in this book: How can outsiders discuss insiders’ beliefs with anything like fairness and accuracy? How can believers converse with unbelievers? And finally, is it possible to persuade people who subscribe to intensely resonant belief systems to adopt different positions? Fundamentalist Christianity is a serious scholarly endeavor—lay believers and ministers study the Bible daily, while seminarians and theologians are steeped in doctrinal and church history. However, fundamentalist scholarship differs greatly in both substance and approach from that practiced in the academy, which term in this context refers to nonfundamentalist universities and colleges. I am indebted in several chapters of this book to masterful studies of American Protestantism and the Christian Right written by scholars in religious studies and the social sciences. But fundamentalist intellectuals regard academic scholarship on religious belief as inaccurate or unfair (Noll). Tim LaHaye, a prolific Christian author, calls scholars who are connected with the academy “secular humanists.” Despite his sweeping representation of academic scholarship, however, not all those who work in universities can rightly be called “secular.” Some of PREFACE x prefaCe the scholars cited here in fact profess religious belief, and at least one is a theologian. I see few ways around the divide erected by conflicting belief systems, short of conversion, for an outsider who would analyze the discourse of believers. As a result I worry that in many places in this book I am simply returning the favor of misrepresentation. One can mitigate the difficulty posed by difference, perhaps, by relying on ethical scholarly standards. Barbara Herrnstein Smith articulates one such set of standards as follows: “accurate citation, representative quotation, nontendentious summary, and forbearance from name-calling and motive-mongering” (Belief xix). I tried to adhere to these standards when reading apocalyptist discourse, but frankly I had difficulty with the last requirement, for reasons I outline later. My seeming inability to bridge these intellectual differences is an extremely frustrating state of affairs, because my professional affiliation, as a rhetorician, commits me to finding the available means of persuasion in any given case. I wrote this book in order to determine whether there is any way in to the intellectual, religious, and political differences studied here. I found a few paths, some well worn and others choked with rabbit brush. But paths there are. ...