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Liberal Education Imperiled3 4 7Encouraging this debate within the halls of academia should be a desiredgoal—providing a space for each to exist:No one can be both a philosopher and a theologian, nor, for that matter,some possibility which transcends the conflict between philosophyand theology, or pretends to be a synthesis of both. But every one of uscan be and ought to be either one or the other, the philosopher opento the challenge of theology or the theologian open to the challengeof philosophy. 109Kronman’s remedy is incomplete even though he is correct that the reasonparents sent their children to college was that these august institutionsclaimed to be an authority on life’s meaning. There were moral and spiritualbenefits to higher education. Certainly, the intellectual life can be a complementto the moral and religious life. When St. Paul addressed the Stoicsand Epicureans in the Areopagus, he dealt with philosophical and religiousissues that Athenians understood. The apostle spoke in a way and in termsthat the pagans understood. 110 Kronman’s position is therefore limited. Theway to revive liberal education is to revive the dialogue between Jerusalemand Athens.109Strauss, “Progress or Return?,” 270.110Kronman, Education’s End, 196–97; Newman, Idea of a University, xxiii; Poe, Christianity in theAcademy, 22. Poe goes on to lament that Christians are called to the marketplace of ideas to propagatethe Truth of salvation, but that pastors have been wont to say that St. Paul was wrong (sinned?) toconverse with philosophers on their own turf. See ibid., 25–26.