While books in this genre usually rue the problematic situation of religious identity, theology, and denominational colleges and universities, Higton's volume changes the focus. He offers “a theologically informed account” of the secular and religiously plural university (3). Further, he argues that real learning (the kind that imparts wisdom and delight) occurs in such institutions. The question “‘What is (or should be, or could be) good about universities?’ . . . is a more basic and more urgent task than cataloging all the ways in which that good” fails to happen (2). The book is a serious attempt to show how theological principles can affirm much good in secular and religiously plural universities.
The book has two main parts. The first part presents overviews of the medieval University of Paris, the nineteenth-century University of Berlin, and Newman's Catholic University of Dublin. The strongest overview is the treatment of Berlin's educational theorists; the weakest is Higton's misreading of Newman on nature and grace and his interpretation of The Idea of a University. Higton misses the transcendental dimension of intellect and contemplation in the Idea as proper to Newman's account of a philosophical habit of mind. Still, he ends the first part with a helpful survey of contemporary views on Christian learning, which includes a selection of theologians who might rank as more or less suspicious of Higton's argument.
Higton argues throughout that university reason is not neutral theologically. When properly disciplined, socialized, and applied, reason does lead to “wisdom and delight” (145). Good reasoning brings with it implicit religious experiences that shape the teleology of learning toward the transcendent. Indeed, one of the richest chapters of part 2 is a constructive Anglican theology of learning that can be read as a stand-alone essay.
Core ideas for university learning and practice are worked out in part 2: (1) reason is an intellectual and spiritual discipline; (2) learning requires free conversation and sociality that is inherently ecclesial; and (3) such reasoning and sociality share a goal of raising questions about and being concerned with the common good. To the extent that students apprentice teachers in this way, the university is more fully itself, a context of genuine learning and citizenship. Chapters on the “virtuous” and “sociable” university are insightful; the one on the “good” university seems promising but delivers little in the way of new concrete proposals for achieving a common focus. Service-learning programs, for example, are absent as agents of public good and citizenship.
Higton's argument targets two audiences. The first audience comprises other Christian theologians and academics. As one, I found the book's general argument correct because I already agreed with the premise about God working beyond explicitly Christian boundaries. The second audience is those academics who teach and pursue research in secular and religiously plural universities. Whether they will agree and profit from Higton's contribution remains unknown. Nevertheless, those interested in religious identity, higher education, and theology should read this book.
