Paradoxes of Progressive Christianity

On March 27-29, scholars gathered in St. Louis, Missouri, at the Danforth Center on Religion & Politics for the conference “Beyond the Culture Wars: Recasting Religion and Politics in the Twentieth Century.” At the pinnacle of the three-day event, James T. Kloppenberg delivered the keynote lecture, entitled “Barack Obama and the Paradoxes of Progressive Christianity.”

Kloppenberg is the Charles Warren Professor of American History at Harvard University. His lecture drew on his 2011 book, Reading Obama: Dreams, Hope, and the American Political Tradition. An intellectual historian of the United States and Europe, Kloppenberg’s current projects include two forthcoming books, Tragic Irony: The Rise of Democracy in European and American Thought and The American Democratic Tradition: Roger Williams to Barack Obama.