Historically, we have been living in homogenous societies. Modern science and technology have has made us aware of opportunities outside our traditional homes leading to the development of pluralistic societies. Can we live in pluralistic societies and the connected world with traditional attitudes?
A human being begins the life journey focused only on the personal physical needs. Life naturally brings spiritual growth in its wake.
Physical development causes the growth of an externally oriented logic involving concepts of personal good and then follows the development of emotional intelligence involving concepts of collective good such as love, compassion, etc.
Spiritual development widens one’s field of concern from self to the family, from family to one’s religious community, from religious community to the community at large, and from there to the whole of God’s creation. Gradually the circle of what one understands as ‘us’ increases and what one understands as the ‘others’ decreases. To a point the process is natural, but then it stops unless aided by an effective system of spiritual education.
Historically, we have been living in homogenous communities and there was little need to expand our concern to include anyone outside of it. Interaction between religious communities was limited. Our mutual connectedness and dependence, though realized by sages and intellectuals, were not obvious and important enough for the general public to spend any effort. Thus, our connectedness with everyone and everything received only a nominal attention. Religious education was intended to build communities and spiritual growth beyond the community was not seen as relevant. So, historically communities have been regarding other communities as ‘others’ and were not educated to include them in the circle of ‘us’.
The world today is different. Many of us live in pluralistic societies. A pluralistic community may be viewed as community of communities. In addition, modern scientific and technological developments have reduced the world into a global village. Our immediate community may be homogenous, but advances in communication and transportation have made mutual interaction a common occurrence and our interconnectedness and interdependence has become obvious. Now for the first time in human history, there is an urgent need to see the whole of God’s creation as one.
There is an immediate need for spiritual development beyond our religious community to include concern and responsibility for all beings for building a just, sustainable, and peaceful global society and also for continued peace, harmony and progress of pluralistic societies of the world. We now need to take the responsibility to look after each other and the planet earth or risk its very destruction. We need spiritual and moral education for sustainable living with each other and with other beings of the planet. We need a clear path of spiritual growth from our self centered lives at birth successively to include responsibility for our family, our religious community, our larger community, and the whole of the universe.
Will this new global focus undermine the community and its religion? The answer must be in the negative. We are taught to transcend our own selfish concerns for the family and we are taught to transcend the family for the community. Is it undermining our selfishness or the family? In the same manner, transcendence of a community for global concerns is not undermining of the community. Transcendence does not mean undermining. Instead, it expands our horizon to be inclusive to a larger and larger extent.
Today’s world needs a new discipline of moral and spiritual education to provide a clear path of transcendence from personal concern to that for one’s family, from the family to the faith community, from the faith community to the larger community, and from the larger community to all beings in the universe. The paradigm for this new discipline must be reason based to make an effective use of the global culture of public education.