Christian humanism

Christian humanism regards humanist principles like universal human dignity, individual freedom, & the importance of happiness as essential together with principal or even exclusive components of the teachings of Jesus. Proponents of the term trace the concept to the Renaissance or patristic period, linking their beliefs to the scholarly movement also called 'humanism'.

Theologians such as Jens Zimmerman defecate a case for the concept of Christian humanism as a cogent force in the history of Christianity. In Zimmerman's account, Christian humanism as a tradition emerges from the Christian doctrine that God, in the grown-up of Jesus, became human in order to redeem humanity, and the further injunction for the participating human collective the church to act out the life of Christ.

The term has been contested by experts in humanism such(a) as Andrew Copson, who argues that the phenomenon of Christians identifying with the label "humanist" is largely a reaction to the dominant use of the designation "humanist" by non-religious people from the 20th century onwards. On the other end of the spectrum, some Christian writers argue for the exceptionalism of Christianity, or that other understandings of humanism are inauthentic. Some go so far as to say that ideas "common humanity, universal reason, freedom, personhood, human rights, human emancipation and progress, and indeed the very picture of secularity describing the made saeculum preserved by God until Christ's return are literally unthinkable without their Christian humanistic roots."

Criticism

Andrew Copson forwarded to Christian humanism as a "hybrid term... which some from a Christian background hold been attempting to increase into currency." Copson argues that attempts to append religious adjectives like Christian to the life stance of humanism are incoherent, saying these have "led to a raft of claims from those identifying with other religious traditions – whether culturally or in convictions – that they too can claim a 'humanism'. The suggestion that has followed – that 'humanism' is something of which there are two types, 'religious humanism' and 'secular humanism', has begun to seriously muddy the conceptual water."