The Sacred and the Secular:

Complementary and/or Conflictual (II)

September 28 – October 30, 2009                                                             Washington, D.C.

DESCRIPTION

Through discussions of selected texts, especially of Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age, and eventually (as the seminar progresses) through prepared presentations, we propose that the present seminar could focus on articulating and describing a new paradigm for philosophizing that enables the sacred and the secular to be lived fully, creatively and cooperatively in order to build a viable global whole.  We propose further that an effort be made to better understand and meet the two major threats to such an undertaking; an attempt will be made, therefore, to clearly analyze and articulate the precise ways in which these threats emerge from the secular realm on one hand, and from the religious, cultural, “sacred” realm on the other, and to suggest ways of overcoming these dangers so that a new paradigm of unity in diversity, which brings the sacred and the secular into a more positive interrelation may flourish in our global times. 

It will be necessary here to see the distinction between Gadamer’s “fusion of horizons,” and Habermas’ insistence on cultivating a special concern for achieving public consensus; the two positions may be complementary, without being the same.  The latter, for instance, may be successful in establishing laws upon which most can agree, but the question remains as to how it is possible to guarantee the intrinsic goodness of such laws.  And even with Gadamer’s “fusion of horizons,” there is a need to constantly plumb the depths of the metaphysical resources available in cultures and civilizations to avoid a “leveling out or a secularization of the sacred”.  In this context, the categories of hierarchy and transcendence must be examined in a new light and with new insights that may serve to complement the realm of the secular without either destroying it or absolutizing it.   

READINGS AND PAPERS

Week One

September 30: 

Professors George McLean and Edward Alam: Introducing Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age and Hans Georg Gadamer’s Truth and Method

October 2: 

Professor Abdul Khaliq Aboya:  (Presentations of Readings) Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age, pp. 1-22

Professor Tadeusz Buksiński:  (Presentations of Readings) HansGeoge Gadamer’s Truth and Method, pp.369-379

October 5: 

Professor Franciscus X. Armada Riyanto and Workineh Kelbessa: (Presentations of Readings) Robert Bellah’s “The Rules of Engagement”

Professor Workineh Kelbessa: (Presentations of Readings): Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age: pp. 430-437

Professor Sayyed Hassan Hussaini (Akhlaq): (Paper): “Rationality in Islam”

Week Two

October 7:

Professor J. Kromkowski: Eric Voegelin’s  (Presentation of Reading) The Ecumenic Age:1-13

Professor Edwin George: (Paper): “Secularism: An Interpretation with Panikkarian Vision and Dallmayrian Concerns”

October 9:

Professor Zef Donders: (Paper): “Religious Identity and Secularization”

Professor Saeed Anvari: (Paper): “An Investigation of the Relationship of the Sacred and the Secular on the Basis of Islam”

October 12:

Professor Indra Nath Choudhuri: (Paper) “Intertwining the Sacred and the Secular: The Indian Approach to Creating a New Humanity”

Professor William McBride: (President of FISP): Dynamic of the International Federation of Philosophical Societies (Guest Lecture) 

Week Three

October 14:

Professor Edward Alam: (Presentation of Reading): C. Taylor’s “Religion Today” pp. 505-539 from A Secular Age

Professor Gadis Arivia: (Presentation of Reading):  James E. Faulconer from Transcendence in Philosophy and Religion ed. James E. Faulconer (Bloomington: IU Press, 2003)

October 16:

Professor Jonathan Bowman:  (Presentation of Reading): Marlene Zarader’s “Phenomenality and Transcendence” from Transcendence in Philosophy and Religion ed. James E. Faulconer (Bloomington: IU Press, 2003)

Professor Zef Donders: (Presentation of Readings): Jose Casanova’s lead article on “Secularization in a Global Perspective” in The Hedgehog Review: Critical Reflections on Contemporary Culture (After Secularization) Spring & Summer 2006, Vol. 8, 1,2.

Week Four

October 19:

Professor Tadeusz Buksinski: (Presentation of Readings): “Introduction” in M. Blondel’s Action

Professor Edward Alam: Voegelin and Taylor on Hegel: Complementary Readings?

Professor Tadeusz Buksinski: (Paper): “The Sacralization of the Profane and the Profanation of the Sacred”

October 21:

Professor Edward Alam: (Presentation of Readings) “Recent Developments in Voegelin’s Philosophy of History” by Stephen McKnight Socioloogcal Analysis, 1975, 36, 4: 357-363

Professor Abdulkarim Soroush: Islam and Secularity (Guest lecture)

October 22:

Special Session: Professor Jonathan Bowman: (Paper): “Religion as ‘Friend or Foe?’ to Solidarity in a Global Age: Charles Taylor on the European Union vs. United States”

October 23:

Professor Jonathan Bowman: (Presentation of Reading): “Dialectics of Secularization: On Reason and Religion/The 2004 Ratzinger and Habermas Dialogue.”

Professor Gian Luigi Brena S.J.  (Paper) “The Sacred and the Secular: from Conflictuality to a Possible Complementarity”

Week Five

October 28:

Professor John Farina: (Paper): “Salazar vs. Buono and the Dialectics of Secularization”

Professor Franciscus X. Armada Riyanto: (Paper): On the nature of the Human Being:

A Challenge from Hobbes’ Anthropology”

October 29:

Professor Workineh Kelbessa: (Paper): “Religious Pluralism, Tolerance, and Public Culture in Africa”

Professors Abdul Khaliq Aboya: (Paper): “Educational Philosophies of Syed Ahmed Khan and Alfred North Whitehead: A Socio-Cultural Perspective”

October 30:

Yan Xin: (Paper): “The Sacred and the Secular: Complementary in the Global Age from a Confucian Perspective”

Professor Roman Vysochansky: (Paper): “Deliberations on “Thought” and “Porous Selves”

Professor George F. McLean: (Paper): “The Role of Philosophy in a Global Age”