The Not So Outrageous Idea of a Christian Sociology

THE NOT SO OUTRAGEOUS IDEA OF A CHRISTIAN SOCIOLOGY by Joseph A. Scimecca. Routledge, 2023. 153 pages. Paperback; $54.99. ISBN: 9781032360171. *There have been a plethora of books touting the outrageousness of Christian academic endeavors in a secular age, and this book, while building on the theme, takes the opposite tack. The trend began with Christian historian George Marsden's short The Outrageous Idea of Christian Scholarship (1996), a supplement to his magisterial The Soul of the American University: From Protestant Establishment to Established Nonbelief (1994), which is now in a 25th anniversary edition with the subtitle From Protestant to Post-Secular (2021). Another example is Paul Gould's The Outrageous Idea of the Missional Professor (2019). Scimecca inserts a negative into his title ("not so outrageous") because he argues that, not unlike the university itself, the origins of sociology have deeply Christian roots. Thus, the idea of Christian sociology ought not to be so outrageous. *However, it is outrageous to many in the dominant culture, as Scimecca's book has not been reviewed by the mainstream sociological journals, even though it's published by Routledge academic. Similar works have been published in the past decades advocating for a Christian sociology and they, too, remain marginal to the discipline.1 While Scimecca does not mention these other books, he does give ample evidence that, historically speaking, Christianity has not been marginal to sociology and, in fact, has been the source of its roots and has inspired some of its best thinkers over the centuries. *One advantage to this book is its brevity, as it is at once shorter and more comprehensive than his more historically specific Christianity and Sociological Theory: Reclaiming the Promise (Routledge, 2018). Students will welcome it for other reasons: it has a strong theme that decries the meaninglessness of an age closed to transcendence and left with only materialistic explanations for human life. Scimecca uses the concept of "shadow nihilism" to describe social science without bearings beyond behaviorism, empiricism, quantification, and the machinations of power. He argues that a holistic view of the human being must include the quest for meaning and an understanding of the moral order that sits at the core of social life. *The structure of the book is clearly chronological, summarizing the prehistory of sociology through Aristotle, various clergymen, theologians such as Thomas Aquinas and key Enlightenment philosophers (chap. 2), then describing the secular turn in the classical European sociologists of Comte, Marx, Durkheim and Weber (chap. 3). These are contrasted with the American social gospel thinkers (chap. 4) whose ethical commitments were rejected by the mid-century positivists bent on imitating the natural sciences (chap. 5). The final chapters push back on the atheistic assumptions of positivistic scientism (chap. 6), offer the basics of a Christian understanding of personhood following the works of George Herbert Mead, Charles Horton Cooley, and Christian Smith (chap. 7), and then lay out broader frames for a Christian sociology by using some concepts from the likes of Dorothy Smith, Roy Bhaskar, Margaret Archer, and Peter Berger (chap. 8). *A strength of the book is how it describes the waning of Christian influence and the gradual rise of a narrow scientism supposedly without ethics, values, or concern for social problems. He offers concise summaries of the work of numerous sociologists in his historical survey, including many Christians. Albion Small (1854-1926) is one illustration: the son of a Baptist minister, he went to seminary at Yale and then studied at the University of Berlin until 1881, where he learned about the new discipline of sociology. He received his PhD in history and political economy from Johns Hopkins University and went on to found the Department of Sociology at the University of Chicago. His goal was to "institutionalize sociology (‘the science of society') as a mechanism for spreading the Social Gospel" and so "pave the way for the Kingdom of God" (p. 63). Due to Small's efforts, the American Journal of Sociology was established, in which he hoped to see theology, morality, and science come together. *Scimecca brings other important Christian sociologists into the foreground, such as Charles Ellwood (1873-1946) at the University of Missouri, men who have either been forgotten by mainstream sociology texts or whitewashed of their Christian commitments. He could have included those beyond American boundaries--Christian social thinkers such as Jacques Ellul and Ivan Illich, for example. More contemporary examples, such as David Lyon in Canada and David Martin and Grace Davie in the UK, would suggest that there are more sociological prophets still left in the discipline. *Another reason the idea of a Christian sociology ought not be so outrageous is that numerous ideologies--feminist, neo-Marxist, and critical race theory, etc.--have all found some legitimation in the academy. They are deeply value-laden and point out the non-neutral and failed objectivity of the positivist paradigm. While this is mentioned in passing, it is curious that, while Scimecca surveys Christian Smith and a variety of his books, he skips over Smith's The Sacred Project of American Sociology (Oxford, 2014). Here Smith contends that modern scientism and objectivity is not so much the problem in American sociology as is a new sacred project--the emancipation project of liberal individualism (what some today would call "woke" scholarship). *While Scimecca points to the social location of sociologists and their atheistic milieu, Smith does a more thorough "sociology of sociology" that shows the link between the objective modern pretense and the postmodern political bias. This is similar to what George Marsden does in his anniversary edition of The Outrageous Idea of Christian Scholarship, as well as what Christian philosopher Nicholas Wolterstorff argues for in his apologetical work, Religion in the University (2019); they describe the postmodern moment as a crack in the secular, opening up a postsecular option that is potentially more friendly to religion. *This seems like a better strategy to me. Scimecca's history is a valuable addition to the conversation about Christian faith and sociology. His description of shadow nihilism and the imperative of a moral core for sociological analysis tied to some notion of transcendence is vital for the common good. What we need is an articulate Christian sociology that is primed for a pluralistic academy, where Muslim, Jew, feminist, and LatCrit theorists can all have a place at the public academic table. This needs to be done not only with the American sociological network in mind, but also with intentional reference to sociologists in the global church and partners beyond. *Note *1E.g., David A. Fraser and Anthony Campolo, Sociology Through the Eyes of Faith (HarperOne, 1992); Russel Heddendorf and Matthew Vos, Hidden Threads: A Christian Critique of Sociological Theory (University Press of America, 2009); David Lyon, Christians and Sociology (InterVarsity Press, 1976); and Matthew Vos, Strangers and Scapegoats: Extending God's Welcome to Those on the Margins (Baker Academic, 2022). *Reviewed by Peter J. Schuurman, executive director of Global Scholars Canada, Guelph, ON.