What I'm reading, if you care

At the recommendation of Fr. Borbridge, one of my professors at Spring Hill (where I hope to return soon), I am reading Peter Berger's Heretical Imperative. It is a sociological work about the crises religions meet in the face of modernity. It was actually written over 25 years ago. Being out of print I had to get it at the Carnegie Library. It is interesting how much he has written 25 years seems to be coming true, and how much also is yet to happen (though you can see it coming).

The word heresy comes from the Greek root meaning "choice." Where once fate (where you were born, for instance) determined your life and religious beleifs, modern people are faced with choices, and this has driven many religions into crisis. What is occurring and is to occur, according to Berger, is outlined in the passage from the preface.

It is my position that modernity has plunged religion into a very specific
crisis, characterized by secularity, to be sure, but characterized more
importantly by pluralism. In the pluralistic situation, for reasons that are
readily visible to historical and social scientific observation, the authority
of all religious traditions tends to be undermined. In this situation there are
three major options, or "possibilities," for those who would maintain the
tradition: They can reaffirm the authority of the tradition in defiance of the
challenges to it; they can try to secularize the tradition; they can try to
uncover and retrieve the experiences embodied in the tradition...I will call
these three options , respectively, deduction, reduction, and induction...I
further argue, however, that only the third option, that of the inductive
approach, is finally viable.

I can't wait to read more and subject you to further passages. I also can't wait to write ad nauseum about induction in the Catholic Church. Okay, maybe I'll just keep some of that to my own personal interior ramblings. I don't want to be a total bore.