LIBERTY IN THE THINGS OF GOD
The Christian origins of religious freedom
By Robert Louis Wilken
Yale University Press. 236 pages. £18.99
ISBN 978 0 300 226 638
Robert Louis Wilken is an outstanding church historian. Ordained as a Lutheran, converted to Catholicism in later life, and now 82 years old, Professor Wilken has turned his considerable intellect to the Christian roots of liberty.
Wilken wants to show that religious freedom is a Christian idea, not something Enlightenment rationalism thought up to contain violent conflict between faiths. His book is a welcome work of scholarship with new insights for the well informed, and an accessible introduction for others.
