Spiritual Preparation, Workshop 7: James Luther Adams, in the What Moves Us Program
Read one of the following for background information on James Luther Adams:
- The James Luther Adams entry in the online Dictionary of Unitarian and Universalist Biography
- Handout 1, Introducing James Luther Adams
Read the story "The Conversion Experience of James Luther Adams," and Leader Resource 1, James Luther Adams' Theology. As time allows, read the two Adams essays, "The Use of Symbols," and "The Love of God," included as Leader Resources 2 and 3.
Use some or all of the following exercises and questions to help you reflect on Adams' conversion experience and his Pragmatic Theory of Religious Beliefs. You are encouraged to write your responses in your theology journal:
- Recall a personal experience in which something occurred that prompted you to change your behavior such that henceforth you no longer acted the same way toward someone or something, or you began a new series of activities or formed new allegiances because some kind of conversion experience, if you will, brought about this change in your behavior.
- Next, identify the feeling that prompted the change in your behavior or that accompanied it.
- Finally, identify the belief (i.e., thought, concept, or idea) linked to this new change in your behavior.
- Be sure to include the way in which your changed behavior has an institutional expression. How does your new behavior indicate you would like to change, or leave unchanged, the protocol of a social, political, or economic institution in your life? An institution, for example, might be your family, your congregation, government, the market economy, a political organization, or a public or private education system.
- Discern whether the belief linked to your changed behavior helped you interpret and explain your internal feelings to yourself and others about your changed behavior; your way of acting towards others (your ethical behavior); and your way of evaluating and explaining (approvingly or disapprovingly) the behavior of an institution towards others.
- Outline a liberal religious belief structure parallel to the conservative religious belief structure delineated by Adams in the essay "Use of Symbols," excerpted below. Then, write a one-sentence definition of Adams' Pragmatic Theory of Religious Beliefs using your own words. Remember, Adams claims that quite often the meaning of an ethical generality can be determine by observing what its proponents wish to change in society or to preserve unchanged. Adams wrote: "Conservatism, generally employing an organic metaphor, emphasizes above all... the 'natural inequalities' of men. Ethical values are derived from the acceptance of these inequalities. For these values conservatism claims the support of a realism that is not blinded by optimistic enthusiasm. The power structure, the separation of the classes, the need for strong leadership, the fundamental skepticism regarding the wisdom of the populace, are taken to be the dispositions that God has given to men; only in the context of this hierarchical structure does the conservative expect to achieve the good life. The powers that have historically evolved are to be regarded as God's ordinances to which one must submit as to a divine institution. They exist by the grace of God and demand submission. The recognition of sin should engender humility, readiness to be obedient and to be faithful to assigned tasks. A struggle for power on the part of the lower classes in order to change the system is the consequence of sin. Those in control of power maintain it by force in the service of God and the community. Through their service the natural process is to be purified and ennobled. Freedom for the average Christian is inner freedom. It can never become the principle of a political structure. The maintenance of the system is itself taken to be the will of God."
- Adams reports that members of the Underground Church (anti-Nazis) said that a thousand of them working together might have stopped Hitler from rising to power and constructing his fascist political institutions. How might this effort, had it happened, have galvanized and thus given "crucial significance" to Adams' pragmatic theory? How might it also have revealed a new aspect of what Adams and his cohort of Unitarian ministers called the "thinness" of liberal theology?
- Adams argues that a religious belief serves as a kind of coordinating or unifying principle between our interior lives and our public behavior—the psychological and institutional spheres of our lives. Adams claims that along with this coordinating function comes a certain tension. He says that our beliefs link our inner and outer lives, our personal and public life. There is tension, Adams argues, because our personal needs for privacy can conflict with our need to take action in the public sphere. So, too, our inner sense of personal freedom is in tension with our recognition that there must be external order and rule. Justice and mercy, participation and privacy, freedom and equality draw on opposing, subjective and objective "virtues," Adams concludes. The tension between these two spheres—the inner and outer—makes it impossible "to deduce precise pragmatic judgments from a given creedal position [i.e., belief]." Moreover, Adams argues, the attempt to ignore the tension and reduce the interests of the two spheres to one and the same "is likely to be overzealous in intention and to reveal ideological taint—the desire to protect special privilege." And so, Adams concludes, "the divisions and tensions [must] remain." Do you agree? Explain in detail.
- Adams tries to establish love as a foundational emotional reference of the word God. Lay out his argument in your own words by listing and numbering the basic claims he makes to support his argument. Once you have completed this list, evaluate each claim (or premise) and determine for yourself whether Adams has put together an argument that makes sense to you for "love" as a fundamental emotion of religious devotion.
- Adams places "voluntary associations" in the meaning-making sphere of human experience, the place that links our internal and public life. Why does Adams believe that voluntary associations operate in this sphere between our inner psychological world and our public social world? Why does he believe that these voluntary groups have the power to change social institutions?
- As Adams notes at the end of his essay, "The Evolution of My Social Concern," the power of voluntary associations today is severely compromised by private, professional, and business interests. What foundation is there for hope today?
Before leading this workshop, review Workshop 1, Leader Resource 1, Accessibility Guidelines for Workshop Presenters.
This work is made possible by the generosity of individual donors. Please consider making a donation today.
Last updated on Friday, December 9, 2011.
Updated and Popular
Popular New Searches
For Newcomers
Learn more about the Beliefs & Principles of Unitarian Universalism, or read our online magazine, UU World, for features on today's Unitarian Universalists. Visit an online UU church, or find a congregation near you.
