Tonight PBS airs the first of a seven-part series from Bill Moyers called Faith & Reason,
which features conversations with writers, many of whom he interviewed
while they were in New York City recently for the PEN World Voices
Festival. The authors are Martin Amis, Margaret Atwood, Mary Gordon,
David Grossman, Colin McGinn, Anne Provoost, Richard Rodriguez, Salman
Rushdie and Jeanette Winterson.
As Moyers explained: "In a world where religion is poison to some and salvation to others, how do we live together? It's an old debate, this discussion of belief and disbelief. On one end of the spectrum people say, 'Only religion counts.' On the other end, 'Only reason counts.'
"Well, I've always been a fellow who falls in the middle of this one. Neither wholly a believer nor wholly a skeptic, I see democracy as a co-operative that depends on our thinking out loud and reasoning through until we resolve the issue."
As Moyers explained: "In a world where religion is poison to some and salvation to others, how do we live together? It's an old debate, this discussion of belief and disbelief. On one end of the spectrum people say, 'Only religion counts.' On the other end, 'Only reason counts.'
"Well, I've always been a fellow who falls in the middle of this one. Neither wholly a believer nor wholly a skeptic, I see democracy as a co-operative that depends on our thinking out loud and reasoning through until we resolve the issue."