Faith on Trial: Communities of Faith, the First Amendment, and the Theory of Deep Diversity

Guinn (International Human Rights Law Institute, DePaul U. College of Law) argues that current U.S. Supreme Court jurisprudence and legal reasoning relating to concepts of religious freedom is both contradictory and discriminatory towards a number of groups, especially if they do not belong traditional forms of Protestant theology or liberal Judaism. He argues that this problem can only be adequately addressed from the standpoint of the theory of deep diversity. Deep diversity, like traditional liberalism, seeks to hold up the rights of the individual, but differs in its rejection of atomistic understandings of the individual in favor of a concept of a human identity that draws on communities of meaning. Guinn explores the implications that this theory would have on legal reasoning on a number of aspects of religious legal freedom. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR