The earth is in turmoil. Global warming, peak oil, terrorism, massive poverty, species extinction, the return of dictatorships, resource wars and other urgent challenges are only the more visible manifestations of the grave challenges facing the planet.

At the same time, humanity has developed very potent social approaches to arrest planetary decline. Appreciative inquiry, emergent dialogue, presencing, theory lemniscate, multiple and appreciative intelligences, and societal threefolding are only some of the more accessible ways to achieve profound societal transformation on the basis of conscious self-transformation. At the core of the struggle to birth a new and more humane, just, and sustainable global civilization is socially engaged spirituality that can release, for the good, the potent creative powers that are latent in each human being. The course will discuss the problems and pitfalls of spirituality without a societal context and draw out the importance of socially engaged spirituality for the appropriate development of individuals and the future of the earth. The course will apply the insights and approaches of generative dialogue to stimulate the emergence of a collective intelligence necessary for engaging the world of tomorrow.

Bridging the world of ideas with the operational requires moral technique and skill in the use of etheric formative forces. We will concentrate on developing these disciplines in the eurythmy portion of the class.

Suggested Reading:

Rudolf Steiner, Philosophy of Spiritual Activity and Towards Social Renewal

Nicanor Perlas, Shaping Globalization: Civil Society, Cultural Power, and Social Threefolding.