Pagans and Christians in the City: Culture Wars from the Tiber to the Potomac (Emory University Studies in Law and Religion)

Synopsis

Traditionalist Christians Who Oppose Same-sex Marriage And Other Cultural Developments In The United States Wonder Why They Are Being Forced To Bracket Their Beliefs In Order To Participate In Public Life. This Situation Is Not New, Says Steven D. Smith: Christians Two Thousand Years Ago Faced Very Similar Challenges. Picking Up Poet T. S. Eliot's World War Ii-era Thesis That The Future Of The West Would Be Determined By A Contest Between Christianity And Modern Paganism, Smith Argues In This Book That Today's Culture Wars Can Be Seen As A Reprise Of The Basic Antagonism That Pitted Pagans Against Christians In The Roman Empire. Smith's Pagans And Christians In The City Looks At That Historical Conflict And Explores How The Same Competing Ideas Continue To Clash Today. All Of Us, Smith Shows, Have Much To Learn By Observing How Patterns From Ancient History Are Reemerging In Today'’s Most Controversial Issues--dust Jacket Flap. A Portentous Question, A Quixotic Proposal -- Homo Religiosus -- City Of The Gods -- Believing In Paganism -- Looking Beyond The World : The Christian Revolution -- The Logic Of Pagan Persecution -- The Struggle For The City -- Under A Christian Canopy -- Secularism And Paganism -- Counterrevolution, Part I : Symbols, Sex, And The Constitution -- Counterrevolution, Part Ii : Religious Freedom -- Coming Home? : The Imminent Immanent City. Steven D. Smith. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.