Search Results for: Jonathan Sacks
Jonathan Sacks on antisemitism
Readers of this blog will know of my deep admiration, gratitude, and respect for the work of Jonathan Sacks. He is among those few contemporary religious leaders who, in my judgement, diagnoses and communicates back to a wide public desperate for wisdom the maladies of our time, and does so with piercing soberness and profound hopefulness. A week […]
Jonathan Sacks: two recent interviews, two book excerpts
In this first interview, conducted by First Things Senior Editor Mark Bauerlein, Jonathan Sacks talks about themes attended to in his latest book, Not In God’s Name: Confronting Religious Violence. They discuss René Girard’s mimetic theory, the sibling rivalry that characterises the relationships between Abraham’s most enduring children – Jews, Christians, and Muslims – and the infinite […]
Jonathan Sacks on one gift that religion bequeaths to liberal democracies
Jonathan Sacks has described the public commons as ‘the places you go where you do not have to pay’. Such places are becoming increasingly rare in the world’s cities; they are being converted into shopping centres and entertainment complexes. ‘But these are not civic spaces. We go there as consumers, not as fellow citizens’. And […]
Is now the time to make art?
What kind of time is this? And what might such a time mean for artists and their work? Beyond the very real financial hit that many artists are currently taking, a great many of us, artists included, are welcoming this abnormal moment to ask other questions – existential questions, and questions about our regular habits […]
Some Recent Watering Holes
I haven’t posted one of these for a while. Here are a number of pages I’ve appreciated visiting this past week or so: Damion Searls on how psychiatrists used Rorschach tests to examine Nazis during the Nuremberg trials. George Monbiot’s piece on being ‘Screened Out’. Julian Cribb on why ‘coal will kill more people than WWII’. […]
Fences
Zadie Smith’s recent piece on Brexit is one of the best-of-its-kind analyses I’ve read on what’s happening in the West – around us, in us, because of us, in spite of us. It is also an invitation to do some seriously-uncomfortable work around dismantling those fences which have become symbols of the end of the […]
The Danger of Outsourcing Morality
Some characteristically thoughtful words here from Jonathan Sacks in his acceptance speech for the Templeton Prize: A free society is a moral achievement. Without self-restraint, without the capacity to defer the gratification of instinct, and without the habits of heart and deed that we call virtues, we will eventually lose our freedom … At some point the […]
Imagination, leadership, and the gift of a safe public commons
Imagine going to an event, as I did last night, where political candidates for the upcoming federal election are asked about what kind of leader they aspire to be, about what kind of leadership might best meet the challenges that are facing our local, regional, and global communities and their moral and physical environments. Imagine […]
An open letter to the Rev Daniel Bullock, Director of Mission & Ministries for the Baptist Union of Victoria
A few week’s ago, on the eve of what was anticipated to be a time of conflict and hostility in Melton, one of Melbourne’s western suburbs, the Director of Mission and Ministries for the Baptist Union of Victoria, the Rev Daniel Bullock, sent out a letter to Baptist church leaders inviting them to pray for […]
NT Wright’s Lambeth Lecture: ‘The Bible and Tomorrow’s World’
NT Wright’s lecture from the 2008 Lambeth Conference (Wednesday, July 30) is available. The topic: ‘The Bible and Tomorrow’s World’. I thought it was a good piece and was worth reposting here: Introduction My theme today has obviously been designed to go with today’s Indaba group work on our use of the Bible. This is […]
