More on Prothero

In response to Jayne's post I would like to focus more on the concerns of how different religions manifest themselves in our world - key phrases used are peoples actions, social groupings, reactions to and creation of political institutions, as well as thinking about questions of what is "real" for these different religions? how do they organize? what is valuable? what should followers do and not do? (Pardon the lack of grammar. This is a journal.)

Confucianism - As I think about values of Confucianism conveyed through Prothero I think about a focus on life here on earth, the here and now but how that includes a spiritual element - there isn't such a strong distinction made between human and spirit. I would like to remind myself that Confucianism does not have a god in the sense of what most religions might define as god. This brings to mind an idea of lack of centralized "power" or governing force - Do religions with a central "god" reflect this in their physical structures of governing forces within religious institutions? within "secular" institutions? Could this be a partial reason as to why Confucianism never was taken on as a national religion in China (Prothero talks more about this)?

Yet, Confucians see "hierarchy as an essential ingredient of social harmony" (p. 112).

Five relationships: ruler/subject; parent/child; husband/wife; elder brother/younger brother; friend/friend

New Confucianism attempts to address and change some of these more rigid, hierarchical elements that Confucius did not challenge and in some cases espoused.

I find a call to seeing how seemingly dichotomous ideas really do complement each other in Confucius' ideas of ren and li

p. 104 Prothero articulates Confucius values to be "reverence for antiquity, respect for education, deference to elders and filial piety." He makes connection with Asian cultures that "excel in school and workplace" as a reflection of their "reverence", learning, hard work and family.

other themes of importance - order out of chaos, order through character, self-cultivation and social harmony are not at odds, human-heartedness and propriety, ren and li,

That's enough for now. Please feel free to comment on any of the themes/ideas above. Much of this is just me getting ideas out - a small step in the process of processing:)

God Is Not One??

I have had a difficult time deciding how much I can agree with Prothero. While I would never claim that the differences in religions are so trivial that we could overlook them, I found myself resistant to his criticisms of perennial philosophers who claim that all religions share a universal truth. I do not know much about perennial philosophy (other than what I have read in this book and on wikipedia) but I felt that just because a person believes that there is a common thread of human spirituality in all religions (or some type of universal truth among the spiritual aspect of the human experience) doesn't mean that this person is blind to the deep diversities and worldviews that are a part of defining each religion. My criticism is that Prothero is not giving space for people to both appreciate the meaning of diversity in our world and entertain a notion of a meaningful spiritual quality that all humans share. Is the idea that all humans share a quest for spiritual meaning enough to claim some type of universal truth about human spirituality?

The more inspiring part of the book was in the conclusion when Prothero mentions groups such as Interfaith Dialogue 2.0 and the Interfaith Youth Core. He claims that these groups are unique in the interfaith dialogue communities because they are, "open to traditional believers, and nonbelievers as well, precisely because it recognizes that genuine dialogue across religious boundaries must recognize the existence of these boundaries and the fundamental differences between the lands they bisect." I feel that his is the primary reason that we have been asked to read this book. As peacebuilding practitioners we must understand the importance of differing worldviews and paradigms that religions have both shaped and been shaped by. Regardless of which religious, theological or philosophical views one subscribes to, we cannot deny the impact of religion.

Why I am interested in peacebuilding

We have been asked to think about this question in research class but more in reference to a particular research project. I haven't been able to come up with a good reason as to why I am interested in the research I am choosing to do which has led me to the larger question of why I am studying peacebuilding.

As I have been reading about healing and reconciliation practices I have been progressively attracted to identity. This is a prominent theme in our studies. I might find questions of identity interesting because it makes me think more in depth about what existence is. Or, what existence means. I might not be able to identify any particular events or conditions of life that have brought me to peacebuilding and studying other cultures in their healing initiatives - although I should continue my search for that - but I can admit to a deeper curiosity about what it means to be alive for different people, cultures, comminities. Studying identity and changes of identity exposes some of those questions?

small group discussion

This evening our group discussed the article, "Dilemmas in a General Theory of Planning" by Horst W. Rittel and Melvin M. Webber. I found it interesting that this article is a modification of a paper written in 1969 and then published in 1973. I suppose this speaks to its continued relevance in 2011.

Having been a school teacher I was interested in the idea of professionals in social services acquiring "professional competencies". This is demonstrated by my teaching license and other fields such as social work would have the same thing. We put so much weight on these titles and then are surprised when social services don't get performed to the degree we expect.

Our expectations and the systems we have created are great for our imagined homogeneous societies but only create more problems our mixed, pluralistic societies.

Challenges to contemorary problem solving: 1) the true ability to distinguish between what is happening and what we want to happen 2) expanding system boundaries 3) understanding complexities of open societal systems

Systems is just a metaphor for us to categorize our world. We should be careful how we use that metaphor because in reality there are no boundaries.

In our discussion a connection was made in the Rittell article with the concept of "leverage points" in Meadows book of "Thinking in Systems". Rittell suggests that identifying "problem centers" and "where and how we should intervene" is not as easy as we think it should be. Could these problem centers be leverage points in Meadow's book? Meadow's talks about the difficulty of identifying leverage points - they sometimes are more difficult to find and don't react to our actions the way we would think they do.

Leverage points and peacebuilding:

We made quick associations between leverage points and entry points into a conflict. Discussed whether they are the same or not. Maybe entry points help us find leverage points. thought of leverage points as stock that has a force behind it - example: if knowledge is a stock in a system and increasing that knowledge would drastically change the dynamic of a conflict, maybe the knowledge is a type of information leverage point. An entry point of for increasing that knowledge could be anyone of the two parties that are interested in increasing their knowledge for the sake of peacebuilding.

Quote taken from the Encyclopedia of Violence, Peace, and Conflict under the entry of Nonviolence: Theory and Practice - How Nonviolence Works: The Theory

"Psychologist Leroy Pelton claims that the idea of self-suffering ‘melting the heart’ of an opponent is a gross oversimplification and that it may even elicit negative reactions toward the victim. He points out that the psychological literature strongly suggests that we have an inbuilt desire to believe that good things happen to good people and serious suffering tends to befall bad people, and therefore we may even dislike, rather than empathize with, those who suffer. In other words, in many cases where moral jiu-jitsu is supposed to operate, it simply does not."

Any comments?

education and systems theory

This particular entry might be in the "other" category. I was reading a paper for theory class and suddenly found myself in conversation - with myself - about our nation's conversation on education. My thoughts have been focused on how much of the conversation I have heard as of late seems to focus on the "supermen" of teachers and the "bad apples". My supposition though is that most teachers don't fall into either of these categories. Most are average humans performing at an average level. I don't intend this to be any derogatory statement. The reality, according to the bell curve, is that most of us aren't great at what we do or awful at what we do.

How might this relate to theory - think systems theory!

If we have a system that requires humans to be superhuman in order to succeed, the system will most likely fail. This isn't to say that the average can't be moved up or down in its performance. But, we must support members in that system so that their average performance achieves the desired goal. Does giving teachers financial rewards for their good work achieve the support that is needed? No. That could be included in a supportive system but if that is the main means of support, this will not work. There is proof that money does NOT make people more happy. Members of a system ideally should be happy with themselves as they do their work. If they work hard and get a lot of money but aren't happy about their life, than they won't be a sustainable force in the system. They will eventually burn out. A FEW people are superhuman and will be able to survive, but those FEW will not sustain a whole system.