The Decline of the Secular University [Hardcover]

C. John Sommerville (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 29, 2006

The American university has embraced a thorough secularism that makes it increasingly marginal in a society that is characterized by high levels of religious belief. The very secularization that was supposed to be a liberating influence has resulted in the university's failure to provide leadership in political, cultural, social, and even scientific arenas.

In The Decline of the Secular University, C. John Sommerville explores several different ways in which the secular university fails in its mission through its trivialization of religion. He notes how little attention is being given to defining the human, so crucial in all aspects of professional education. He alerts us to problems associated with the prevailing secular distinction between "facts" and "values." He reviews how the elimination of religion hampers the university from understanding our post-Cold War world. Sommerville then shows how a greater awareness of the intellectual resources of religion might stimulate more forthright attention to important matters like our loss of a sense of history, how to problematize secularism, the issue of judging religions, the oddity of academic moralizing, and the strangeness of science at the frontiers.

Finally, he invites the reader to imagine a university where religion is not ruled out but rather welcomed as a legitimate voice among others. Sommerville's bracing and provocative arguments are sure to provoke controversy and stimulate discussion both inside and outside the academy.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. Brief, hard-hitting and often brilliant, this treatise by emeritus historian Sommerville builds the controversial argument that secular universities in America have neglected religion at their peril. "The secular university is increasingly marginal to American society," he contends, adding that this marginalization is a direct result of universities' secularism. Even as Americans have become ever more religious, the university has become a credential factory rather than a place where students seek answers to life's most important questions. While the book is long on diagnosis, it comes up a bit short on prescription. Sommerville points to some tantalizing (and contentious) potential solutions, like allowing religion back into public debates and resurrecting the practice of teaching required courses on Western civilization, but one is left hoping that the full outline of his recommendations might be fodder for a second book. (July 7)
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Review

"This intelligent work is essential reading for all who share concern about the quality of higher education and teh secular eroding of its intended purposes."--Journal of Dispensational Theology

"Everyone who cares about the quality of higher education should read this book. It presents the best case I have seen for why the dogged secularism of many universities is undermining the announced purposes of higher education. Secularists may dismiss Sommerville's most telling observations, but they will find them difficult to counter."--George Marsden, author of The Soul of the American University: From Protestant Establishment to Established Nonbelief and Jonathan Edwards: A Life

"Sommerville's arguments will threaten and infuriate many, but his challenge deserves to be engaged. Many secular, particularly state, universities suffer from a hollowness or duplicity at their core, which ultimately undercuts their intellectual mission. Many within who embrace thicker worldviews simply work around that hollowness and duplicity. Sommerville here takes it all head-on, with a case portending deep transformations of higher education in decades ahead."--Christian Smith, author of Moral, Believing Animals: Human Personhood and Culture

"John Sommerville's intelligent assessment of the contemporary American research university is part jeremiad, part careful history, part insightful current events, part trenchant criticism, part hopeful dreaming. Particularly in his brief against the mindless drift of secularism and for a thoughtful correction by religious conviction, Sommerville offers sage wisdom that all who value the life of the mind should take seriously indeed."--Mark Noll, author of America's God: From Jonathan Edwards to Abraham Lincoln

"Universities should really matter. John Sommerville explains why they matter less and less - and how they could again matter by taking up the questions that really matter. "--(The Rev.) Richard John Neuhaus, editor in chief of First Things

"John Sommerville has written a valuable book that calls universities to task for their narrowness in addressing the big questions of what it means to be human, how to understand history, and what to think about difficult moral issues. He suggests as one possibility that academics reconsider the role of religion. This will strike many as a novel idea. They are the ones who especially need to read this book."--Robert Wuthnow, author of American Mythos: Why Our Best Efforts to Be a Better Nation Fall Short

"Brief, hard-hitting, and often brilliant, this treatise builds the controversial argument that secular universities in America have neglected religion at their peril."--Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

"Recommended for anyone interested in the relationship between religion and higher education." --Journal of Education and Christian Belief

"The study is an important contribution toward redefining the idea of a university or at least recalling what a university could--and should--be."--"Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 160 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (June 29, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195306953
• ISBN-13: 978-0195306958
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #544,539 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Athens and Jerusalem revisited, August 24, 2006

By 

J. D. Walters "Heyzeus7" (Burlington, NJ) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Decline of the Secular University (Hardcover)

This book is a breath of fresh air, a desperately needed antidote to the secularism of the modern academy. In clear, elegant, passionate prose, Sommerville makes his case for why religious discourse needs to take place in the academy again, and not just in terms of what people actually believe, but through the use of religious concepts, such as morality, human transcendence, purpose, etc. as applied even to the most secular bastions of inquiry, including science, history and philosophy.

For a book this short the breadth and scope of this book is amazing. Sommerville touches on human nature, the scope and character of science, religious studies, the fact/value dichotomy, all contributed to his overall case for religion in the university. It simply bristles with brilliant insights. For example, referring to the tendency to subordinate humanity to an indifferent Universe, Sommerville notes that "the fact that nature contains human beings says something about nature as well", meaning that, if nature is indifferent, and human beings are a part of nature and they care, what does that say about human beings or nature? Likewise concerning the debate over animal rights, in referrence to the title of a book by Peter Singer called "Animal Rights and Human Obligations", Sommerville observes that unless the titular roles can meaningfully be reversed to read "Human rights and animal obligations", there is no case to be made, because animals will not participate in the resulting moral discourse.

Sommerville also makes some long-overdue observations about the secular critique of Christianity. When secularists condemn the Crusades, the Inquisition and so on, they do so based upon Christian moral principles, as these events would not have been criticized in, say, the Roman Empire. It is obvious that ideas such as truth, meaning, morality, purpose, transcendence, justice, beauty, etc. have coherent and well-defined roles in the Christian discourse, whereas secular culture seems to have borrowed them wholesale from Christianity and it seems very difficult to ground them in any secular meaning whatsoever. Sommerville also pays attention to the need to recognize the different kinds of rational discourse and the necessary relativism that arises, without succumbing to post-modern incoherence.

Just from the footnotes it is clear that religious thinkers have a veritable treasure house from which to draw sound, important scholarship, including philosophers such as Charles Taylor, Alvin Plantinga, Alasdair MacIntyre, etc., historians such as Mark Noll and George Marsden, theologians like Emil Brunner and John Millbank, etc. The Father's house has many mansions indeed, which we ignore at our peril.

In all this book is inspiring and inspired. It clearly represents the culmination of a lifetime of dedicated scholarship by an eminent historian who is also a Renaissance man in the fields of philosophy, sociology and science. Secular scholars should read and be challenged. Religious scholars should read, be inspired and then be challenged to carry out Sommerville's proposed mission. This is the manifesto for religious scholarship in a secular age. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Provocative and Important Stuff, August 19, 2006

By 

Christian Smith (Chapel Hill, NC) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Decline of the Secular University (Hardcover)

Sommerville's arguments will threaten and infuriate many, but his challenge deserves to be engaged, not dismissed or emoted against. Secularism's exclusion of religious perspectives, the book argues, undercuts the very intellectual mission of higher education broadly defined. The open-minded reader will find it a very persuasive case. Short, provocative, easy reading.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Well Stated, Sir., January 13, 2011

By 

Diogenes - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Decline of the Secular University (Hardcover)

This work was referenced in another I was reading. I found the positions advanced by the author to be interesting and well thought out. A good read for anyone in academia.