Philosophy of religion and the big questions

Whether philosophy of religion can have a robust future depends on whether it can develop forms that address the Big Questions of religion. I define religion heuristically, for the purposes of philosophy of religion, as the engagement of ultimate realities, and ultimate dimensions of experience, in cognitive, existential, and practical ways. This requires setting philosophy of religion within a larger scale of philosophy that can deal with ultimates, how they are known, and how such philosophy can defend itself against attacks against the possibility of philosophies of ultimate reality. Philosophy of religion is interesting only if it can say, with good arguments, whether we get ultimate realities right when engaging them. The threats to the future of philosophy of religion come from those forms of the discipline that talk only about how to talk about religion or that only describe religious experience without giving a critical normative account of what is experienced as ultimate. The key to advocating philosophy of religion that addresses the Big Questions is showing that it is plausible and possible to have a philosophy of ultimates. The bulk of this article proposes such a philosophy as a plausible hypothesis. Even if this hypothesis about ultimates is rejected in the long run, that will only be by the presentation of a better hypothesis about ultimates. The paideia for philosophy of religion dealing with the Big Questions is discussed, as is the development of an interested audience for such philosophy of religion.