The Challenge of Secularism: Is God Absent?
This UDMcast features Robert Bellah, The Elliot Professor of Sociology Emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, recorded April 02, 2008. Running time is 1 hour 24 minutes. Select UDMcast format below.In April 2008, the UDM Catholic Studies program invited Robert Bellah, emeritus professor of Sociology at the University of California at Berkeley, lead author of Habits of the Heart: Individualism and Commitment in American Life and The Good Society, and possibly the foremost social philosopher in America today, to address the UDM community.
Bellah discussed how we can understand the presence of God in the midst of a highly secular society, analyzing the social and cultural forces that make it difficult to experience that presence, and addressing the contribution of a Catholic imagination to helping to resolve the difficulty.
In December 2000, Bellah received the United States National Humanities Medal from President Clinton. The award cited Bellah's efforts to "illuminate the importance of community in American society. A distinguished sociologist and educator, he has raised our awareness of the values that are at the core of our democratic institutions and of the dangers of individualism unchecked by social responsibility."
For more on Bellah at UDM, see the news release.
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