Philosophy of Religion

“What is religion? Can man be truly human without being religious? If so, how? If not, why are the problems connected with religion so notoriously difficult to solve? Although most of our time in this class will be spent examining specific problems which arise out of man's religious nature and searching for adequate solutions, our overall goal will be to answer these four, more general questions. Because religion is a phenomenon experienced by almost everyone, but is experienced in such a wide variety of ways, it is difficult, if not impossible to define "religion". Good definitions for English words often begin by citing the meanings of the original Latin or Greek word(s) from which the word in question is derived. However, no one is certain about which Latin words gave rise to the term "religion". Although various suggestions have been proposed, the most commonly accepted explanation (made by St. Augustine about 1600 years ago) is that "religion" comes from the words "re" and "ligare", which together mean "to tie back"--i.e., to reunite a broken bond. If the "re" is also taken to allude to the Latin word "res" (meaning "substance" or "reality"), then we could say that religion is the human experience of reuniting the broken bond between mankind and some transcendent Reality, called "God" in most religions.” 

Philosophy of Religion
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