It is impossible to deny that Christians and Muslims have a common agenda here: both faiths have at their heart the living image of a community raised up by God's call to reveal to the world what God's purpose is for humanity.
Rowan WilliamsRead
Incidentally, one of the most worrying problems in the impact of Western modernity on traditional culture is that it quite rapidly communicates its own indifference or anxiety or even hostility about age and ageing.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote addresses the negative effects of Western modernity on traditional cultures, particularly regarding attitudes towards age and aging.
Rowan Williams highlights a significant concern that Western modernity brings with it a cultural narrative that often undervalues, misunderstands, or even negatively regards aging. This attitude can lead to a troubling disconnection between generations, where traditional cultures, valued for their wisdom and heritage, may feel threatened or dismissed in the face of a fast-paced modern world fixated on youth and innovation.
Themes
AgeAgingCultural ImpactModernityTraditional CultureRespect For Elders
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about cultural inclusion, one might reference this quote to advocate for valuing the wisdom of older generations.
More from Rowan Williams
All quotes →As the gospels present it to us, the mission of Jesus of Nazareth is about the way in which the community of God's people - historically, the Jewish people who had first received the law and the covenant - is being re-created in relation to Jesus himself.
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Keeping our eyes on journey's end is what we need - the place where we see at last the world that is greater than the world, the new creation that cannot be contained in present thought or social order or piety.
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Our present ecological crisis, the biggest single practical threat to our human existence in the middle to long term, has, religious people would say, a great deal to do with our failure to think of the world as existing in relation to the mystery of God, not just as a huge warehouse of stuff to be used for our convenience.
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Institutions develop because people put a lot of trust in them, they meet real needs, they represent important aspirations, whether it's monasteries, media, or banks, people begin by trusting these institutions, and gradually the suspicion develops that actually they're working for themselves, not for the community.
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A flourishing, morally credible media is a vital component in the maintenance of genuinely public talk, argument about common good.
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