Living Words: Studies in Dialogues about Religion

Efforts to speak about religion regularly get mired in confusion and conflict. Terence Martin argues that such talk might go better if participants adopted certain postures and practices of speech — in particular, the habit of critical thinking, a sense of irony, and an irenic approach to opposition. In this book, he takes his method from the conviction that literary dialogues on religious topics are useful tutors with respect to both the problems and the possibilities of religious discussion. In demonstrating the value of religious dialogue, Martin also provides fresh readings of Plato and Lucian, Anselm and Erasmus, and Hume and Diderot.