PAUL TILLICH AND THE RELIGIOUS

SITUATION OF AMERICAN
INTELLECTUALS

Stuart Mews
Lecturer in Sociology of Religion, University of Lancaster

This essay is intended as a contribution to the recent increase of interest

among some sociologists of religion in the cognitive dimension of religious
commitment, the neglect of which was rightly deplored by Roland Robert-
son in a previous number of this journal . 1 Several recent developments have
contributed to a partial rectification of this neglect . The revival of interest
in the sociology of knowledge particularly the increased appreciation of the
work of Georg Lukacs stimulated by Lucien Goldmann has brought to a
vigorous maturity a tradition which seemed to have languished since the
death of Karl Mannheim .2 Another factor has been the establishment of
a more broadly-based sociology of knowledge deriving its current impetus
from the work of Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann which has as its
aim `the analysis of the social construction of reality', and has to do with
`whatever passes for "knowledge" in a society' . 3 A third factor has been the
somewhat belated introduction into the sociology of religion of certain
models and theories developed by Talcott Parsons and other structural
functionalists . In particular, Roland Robertson and Louis Schneider have
drawn attention to the value of the concept of a religious culture analogous
to the notion ofa political culture which has recently figured so prominently
in the speculations of political theorists . 4 The components of a religious
culture are, of course, religious beliefs, theologies, and ideologies . Robertson
has called for the exploration of the relationships of the religious culture
with the general culture and social structure of the society, and with the
social structure of the religious group which adheres to it . Schneider has
been careful to stress the different levels of religious culture ; he has been
especially interested in its instrumentalization, which he links with what E . R .
Leach has called practical religion . To appreciate the importance of religious
culture, religious beliefs or religious doctrines, is not of course to take a
position of either cultural determinism or cultural relativism . Nor should
Parsons' warning go unheeded when he insisted in commenting on a
wellknown article by Clifford Geertz that religion is `never only cultural' .5
The approach which is adopted here does not fit neatly into any of the
positions indicated above, but impinges on several of their concerns . In
particular, it takes seriously Robertson's regret (which is shared by Berger
and Luckmann) that those sociologists who are interested in beliefs `have
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