David B. Robinson

Bonhoeffer's Black Jesus: Harlem Renaissance Theology and an Ethic of Resistance

This final chapter’s focus is Scherer’s successful attempt to connect the ideas of individual narrative conversion, a generalized local and national reform of the social contract, an awareness of globalization and the need for justice, and a convoluted connection between religion and politics. The conclusion introduces the reader to thepossibilityCharlesTaylor’sASecularAge offers, but it is ultimately reluctant to accept the definition(s) of secularismpresented by Taylor. Most notably, Scherer addresses his concern of Taylor’s exclusion of nontraditional religions, atheism, Islamic countries, and Africa as important voices in the debate on secularism. This is especially evident in Taylor’s treatment of secularism and feminist scholars; addressing issues in Egypt, India, and other global locations, Scherer notes the shortcomings of Taylor’s theory (228–229). Scherer remains hesitant to endorse Taylor in the same way he favored Rawls and Cavell in earlier chapters. The comprehensive text is certainly intellectually engaging; however, it may require prerequisite readings of Augustine’s Confessions, Locke’s Letter Concerning Toleration and An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Rawls’s A Theory of Justice and Political Liberalism, and selections of Taylor’s A Secular Age. Scherer’s book may best be used in a course on political theology that engages these texts. Nevertheless, the text succeeds in examining conversion as an important task for democracy and its future (234).