Jacques Maritain's Personalistic Society and Pluralism

Abstract

Jacques Maritain's concept of ttte personalistic society describes a democratic unity of the body politc that mitigates the tension between the material and spiritual aspects of human existence. This unity, grounded in the principles of natural law, makes possible in our terrestrial existence a communion of good living and a rectitude of life--what Maritain calls the bonum honestum. The good he envisions both facilitates and reacts the ideals of an integral Christian humanism, but it necessarily requires for its realization the infusion of Christian ideals into the body politic. It is crucial to Maritain that the process by which this infusion occurs allow for a wide participation of diverse actors, bothh religions and non-religious. But it is also crucial that they are able to converge from their different perspectives into an agreement on "Christianly inspired" practical principles that will subsequently guide public policy. This essay argues that the collective character of the moral personally represented by Maritain in this unity describes a problematic corrtext tor public dialogue that risks undermining the social and political pluralism it presupposes.