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Invitation to an
International Conference
Religion and Culture after Modernity
St. Theresa Theological Institute
Sinaia, Romania
June 9-10, 2004
The
20th century
has not been kind and will be remembered as a period of
oppressive ideologies and of wars, hot and cold. In all this
religion has been especially under attack.
Now, as we move into the
new millennium and a period as yet able to be designated
only as “post-modern” the challenge opens before us, in the
words of John XXIII in convoking the Second Vatican Council,
“to restore the visage of humanity in the image of Christ”.
For this new opportunities open before us.
No
longer does the rationalism which marked modernity claim
unquestioned adherence. To the contrary there would appear
to open new sensitivity to human subjectivity and hence to
issues of values, culture and the relations between peoples
in these terms. If the cultural heritage of a people
reflects the ways in which they have responded to the
inspiration of the Holy Spirit over time, then their culture
can best be seen as the place where the Spirit dwells and
the terms in which we can cooperate in God’s work in time –
the essence of religion.
It is
important then to look in depth at cultures as composed of
the values and virtues of a people and at their present
transformations in order to cooperate with the work of the
spirit in our times.
What
are the values which we inherit and which mark our people;
what are the pressures which undermine or reorient them in
our times; how can we contribute to the formation of our
children and to the future direction of our culture?
These
and other related issues will be the subject of these
deliberations.
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