 Dewey’s call for a common faith was, he thought, deeply democratic. Why? Because the idea of the supernatural was, by definition, suspicious of experience (as an adequate guide) and, consequently, suspicious of empirical methods of inquiry. Unchecked by lived experience or experiment, supernaturalism can produce especially deep divisions. The approach of Dewey’s common faith is, in contrast, intertwined with experimental inquiry—drawing upon lived experience and constantly renewed through open communication. This is why Dewey’s exhortation to trade traditional religious faith for a common faith in empirical intelligence is of a piece with his experimental ideal of democracy.