Between relativism and fundamentalism...

Peter Berger has what looks like the beginnings (I'll have to get ahold of his entire article to get a better picture of his thinking) of a brilliant analysis of the interrelated problems between relativism and fundamentalism in dealing with serious moral and political problems in the most recent American Interest...

http://www.the-american-interest.com/ai2/article.cfm?Id=157&MId=5

As he writes:

"For reasons that may not be immediately obvious, relativism and fundamentalism as cultural forces are closely interlinked. This is not only because one can morph and, more often than may be appreciated, does morph into the other: In every relativist there is a fundamentalist about to be born, and in every fundamentalist there is a relativist waiting to be liberated. More basically, it is because both relativism and fundamentalism are products of the same process of modernization; indeed, both are intrinsically modern phenomena of going to extremes. What follows is an attempt, by means of a sociological analysis, to show how the two phenomena are related."

So true, so true...and perhaps the most important thing they both have in common is being organized by reaction rather than more rigorous thought...

Linda Lovelace and Jim Bakker embody Berger's notion that "In every relativist there is a fundamentalist about to be born, and in every fundamentalist there is a relativist waiting to be liberated" to a tee...

But the truth is that there is at least a little relativist and fundamentalist in all of us, I think...I know I learn more each day about my own extremes...

Looking forward to reading this article...

Love,
Ben