Sociology professor Samuel Perry’s new book Religion for Realists: Why We All Need the Scientific Study of Religion isn’t the first time a Protestant intellectual has attempted to articulate a “realist” view on religion. The most prominent example before him comes from the Christian Realist school of thought advanced by the theologian Reinhold Niebuhr (who identified its progenitors in Augustine and Luther), which pushed against the utopian Social Gospel adherents of his day in favor of a Christian worldview that understood the limitations of humans’ fallen natures. Perry, on the other hand, bases his “realism” not on theological but on sociological grounds, arguing that religion should not be understood as freely-chosen forms of faith but rather as tribal identities and social structures. Both forms of realism involve an acknowledgment of human limitations: Niebuhrian realism teaches that humans are limited by our sinful nature, while Perry’s realism teaches that humans are limited by the way we imagine ourselves as rational individuals.
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