Keller on Liberal Democracy

"Human communities should be completely inclusive, open to all on the basis of our common humanity... All that is required for such community life is that each person respects the privacy and rights of others and works for equal access to education, jobs and political decision-making for all. Common moral beliefs are not necessary, it is said in a "liberal democracy"

...Liberal democracy is based on an extensive list of assumptions -- a preference of individuals to community rights, a division between private and public morality, ad the sanctity of personal choice. All of these beliefs are foreign to many other cultures. A liberal democracy is based then on a shared set of very particular belifes.

Western society is based on shared commitments to reason, rights and justice, even though there is no universally rcognized definition of any of these. Every account of justice and reason is embedded in a set of some particular beliefs about the meaning of human life that is not shared with everyone. The idea of a totally inclusive community is, therefore an illusion. Every human community holds in common some beliefs that necessarily create boundaries, including some people and excluding others from its circle...

...Any community that did not hold its members accountable for specific beliefs and practices would have o corporate idntity and would not really be community at all. We cannot consider a group exclusive simply because it has standards for its members.

Is there then no way to judge whether a community is open and caring rather than narrow and oppressive? Yes there is. Here is a far better set of tests:

Which community has beliefs that lead its members to treat persons in other communities with love and respect- to serve them and meet their needs? Which community's beliefs lead it to demonize and attack those who violate their boundaries rather than treating them with kindness, humility and winsomeness?"

-- Timothy Keller, "Community Can't Be Completely Inclusive" in The Reason for God, Belief in an Age of Skepticism.