ABSTRACT (300 words)

The Protestant Principle and the Quest for Truth and Justice

Philosophy is love of wisdom. To attain wisdom is to know the truth. And Christian philosophy
is a quest for truth because all truths come from God. With social media, internet and other
means of telecommunication, truth should be more accessible today. But what we are seeing is
the exact opposite. We live in a world that not only denies truth, but is against truth. What we
have today is the proliferation of “fake news.” Some government officials, leaders of
corporations including religious institutions have employed deception, disinformation, and
suppression of the truth. Many seek power, domination, money, control, military might, and
fame—anything but the truth. They have lied to people and subverted the truth just to remain in
power. To deny truth is to commit injustice. Christians, of all people, should be unremitting
critics of those who deny the truth and those who peddle “alternative truths” whenever they arise.
Christians cannot close their eyes to the truth. We are called to bear witness to the TRUTH. This
paper will expound on Tillich’s Protestant Principle (PP) as a means to find truth and expose
falsehood. For Tillich the Protestant Principle serves as prophetic judgment against religious
pride, ecclesiastical arrogance, and secular self-sufficiency and their destructive consequences. It
will have three parts 1) Pp as opennes to the transcendence, 2) PP as criticism of human
absolutism, and 3) PP as emancipatory.