Ira Chernus, a professor of religious studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder, talks about the power of myth and the potential for a progressive message of "us with them" as opposed to "us versus them."
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3 comments:
Maybe, even in diverse societies like Canada and the United States, we can construct a progressive myth if we have the will to believe that we are human first, whatever else we are is secondary and subordinate to that fact ?
brilliant perspective very insightful,and the inquiry begs us into action...our Board is well pleased to have started our meeting today with your commentary...
Really enjoyed the talk. As Ira Chernus went through his outline, or world view, I get saying right, right, right - as I checked off my logic steps check list - I'm in total agreement.
I've been thinking along these lines for several years now, my catch phrase is "a new left narrative". I agree with Ira Chernus that this has to, in a major way, include an understanding of the history of the religious activists of the social justice movements that go back so far in American, and Canadian history.
The way I look at religion is it is, to use the term Northrop Frye made popular, a great code, a myth developed over millennia - and yes, sometimes used by the twisted and the amoral towards power and exploitation of the ignorant - but also used in a progressive way, and more often I would say, to create advances like the New Deal, and later the vision of the 'Great Society'.
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