Mary Evelyn Tucker at the Parliament of the World's Religions

we at the parliament of world's religions to explore what the future of religion is and to kind of talk about kind where we're going in the 21st century and how religions have to change to get there if they can change or not if we need a new tradition so these kinds of questions and in what ways do they need the change to meet the kind of the challenge of our of our time the political social ecological challenges that we have which are becoming more and more urgent these days what do you is like the fundamental challenge for religious Traditions that they must meet if we're going to make the kind of breakthroughs that we need to make to to solve the kind of problems that we have to solve if we're going to really survive and thrive into the next 50 years or so the key challenge is that of the environment the sense of what we're doing to ecosystems this destruction of Life the species Extinction and so on that is so enormous so almost Unthinkable um and that if religions don't speak to this sense that life is sacred in all of its forms um and that we have emerged out of a vast and mysterious process then religions are going to lose their own relevance um because for the most part and for a long long time they have been guides in orienting us to the Great rhythms of nature right the seasonal cycles and the winds and the air and the water and our orientation right here to the Mediterranean this pulsation of life and its Connection in the the fish and all the systems right there so I think that these sensibilities which are very ancient of course in the religions and resonate deeply in ourselves are one of the main things that religions need to speak to to revive and reconstruct their ideas for this huge ecological crisis that we're facing right I know I know that your work has been inspired by tar des shardan and and his influence on kind of that he came up from that Christian Perspective and really trying to to reinvent Christianity to to embrace the evolutionary process in a way and he I know he said I think he said something to the fact that Traditions who don't recognize this kind of deep time perspective that we in this developmental process you know are not going to be relevant they're going to lose their relevance for the 21st century you know so do you see that uh do you agree first of all maybe do you agree that's true that they're going to have to begin to embrace that too yes I think I think that is true um to a a very large extent and I think was one of the great Visionaries of the 20th century as you're suggesting to give us that deep deep time and also to give us an integral sense of spirit and matter evolving in a powerful way so that you get greater complexity and greater Consciousness over the trajectory of this evolutionary process and that perspective alone I think um is a tremendous gift for the world's religions to rethink um their own sensibilities and relevance for the uh the modern world because it's very clear that the this crisis uh will transform the religions themselves right right right if they if they face it if they I guess yes if they face it if they respond to it exactly and if they don't um they're losing the the grounds on which um they have stood for centuries that we stand in awe of life you know there's a burning bush metaphor here if you will the earth is burning right and and what is going to be the of all of us who sense this in a very tactile sensual way this is sensuality at its essence you know the heart of matter is something alive and burning and passionate right right absolutely I often understand the the religious Traditions I mean they that worldview that come from that that that non-developmental worldview that cyclical worldview that they were formed Med in the in the in that Crucible of that time was and and from often um Traditions have uh most religious Traditions have very that that they they are formed in with with the idea of the Transcendence of what's beyond this world not not so intrinsic they were not intrinsically kind of created to deal with the conditions of this world in a way that's not where their focus was originally set out to to embrace so in the same way now I know there you know the each tradition has many different elements so I'm in that but do you feel that we have to get away from that trans that Transcendent kind of Beyond this world attitude that's so fundamental to to often to religious Traditions I think that's a very large part of it namely that we need to identify this is the way I would put it we need to retrieve that which is going to be helpful in this crisis we need to re-examine critically reexamine the sources scriptures rituals symbol systems practices and then we need to um reconstruct if you will reimagine these traditions in this new context so for example to say that um our whole orientation is simply to another world um is is an element of these some of these Traditions that needs to be uh rethought at the same time the Traditions that I'm most familiar with those of East Asia and Confucianism in particular um is a tradition that has vast resources for a sensibility of the sacredness of human relations the sacredness of human Earth relations the sacredness of what they call Heaven Earth and human the cosmos the Earth and human as nested relationships and the orientation is very much within this world has a highly developed political and educational system social commitment and so on so those are the aspects of the Traditions that need to be recovered right you will restored good well maybe maybe I can ask you how how uh because if I look at the Traditions I see I see very exciting elements emerging you know I see these these strains of thought you know kind of emerging here and there and and and it's definitely there's a sense that it's growing that people are becoming more aware they want to respond either ecologically or they want to they want to develop these new you know people are embracing Evolution as a context for their for their spiritual lives you you see all these all the you know there's an active M growing even in Traditions where there hasn't been an activism like Buddhism you see all these different things happening and there all maybe different expressions of of of a similar kind of awareness that something needs to really move forward but the at the same time given the the urgency of the real urgency that you look at of the life conditions now and given given uh given given that so the so many of the you know these the vast probably majority of these religions are are not embracing those kinds of innovative element M uh how are we doing are we going to make it what has to happen are you optimistic Do You Feel Like We Do you know what has to happen to really to to get us over the over the great question important question you know we started these series at Harvard from 95 uh we began the idea in 96 we convened the first one and through to 98 so a three-year process of a very intense examination of 10 of the major world religions including indigenous traditions and then we had as well at Harvard at the United Nations and at the Natural History Museum in New York several thousand people Gather in conjunction with Scientists economists Educators policy people to suggest what are the resonances here what are the connections we've also created in addition to publishing the 10 volumes from the Harvard series a quite massive website that um Builds on this process identifies all the resources annotates the bibliographies of the Traditions but then as well has put up um science papers um policy papers ecological economics to say this needs to be a conversation in conjunction with with these other areas now so what I'm saying is that if you take from 95 when also the Greek Orthodox patriarch started his important Symposium green patriarch right on water issues and we've gone on the one on the Adriatic and the Baltic and they're quite extraord extraordinary um but so if you take this period which is not yet 10 years um it's actually I think a rather short period but a tremendous compression of activism as well as re theorizing if you will reconceptualizing and the idea is to put together this deep thinking um of the Harvard project with identifying we've already identified about a 100 Grassroots projects around the world as you suggest you know Buddhist tree ordination and cleanup of the some of the Sacred rivers and India and so on very interesting projects tree planting projects in South Africa which are very ecumenical shown of peoples African peoples with Christian churches and so on so what I'm suggesting is the potential is enormous the energy has been beyond anything we would have imagined and as a person coming out of the 60s civil rights movements and anti-vietnam War I can really say that in my lifetime I've never seen anything that has tapped into such positive energy um so what I would suggest is the next 10 years in the next 10 years in your lifetimes I think this will be reconfigured into a very significant movement it's just at the beginnings if you will of a movement but the statements again if you look up at the on the website the statements of some of these Traditions are magnificent eloquent about this conjunction for life and even one of the most interesting ones is the Greek Orthodox patriarch the green patriarch with the Pope when we landed in Venice in the Adriatic um trip two years ago they had a joint statement released on the importance of this issue it was historic meeting of these two Traditions so it is calling forward some am aming possibilities but the question is how to realize it so these are I think hope very hopeful signs wouldn't have imagined you know even 5 years ago 10 years ago good do you think that we need a new tradition or that a new tradition will be forming out of this time I think this eosp spiritual sensibility is um moving I think on a whole another level um and that uh whether we can say we be a new religion or not I I don't know exactly um but I think there's a trans religious Consciousness you know that is very much present and is certainly picking up I feel the energies of the Next Generation and um wants to emerge in some way do you feel in a sense we could call that because if you look at the the religious Traditions or the the enlightenment those are kind of fundamental movements in history do you see that on the same on the on the same level as as a movement that's emerging out of the out of this time I do actually I think it and I think we need to see it in that historical level I think um it's you know we have all of these discussions of Beyond modernity and postmodernity and post deconstruction you know we have deconstructed in the late 20th century to the maximum level can't go any farther everything and while that has been exhausting it's been necessary now we have to construct exactly right yeah yeah and you know out of World War II and this massive destruction of Western civilization and existentialism and unst and lack of purpose and you roll the ball up the hill and you so it's meaningful says Camu and you know the Miss of cisus that's not enough it's not enough and so I think without doubt this deconstructive moment in all of its ramifications including music and the Arts and on you know in in every way um that that new reconfiguration I think will be historic and that's what the 21st century is beginning to catch glimmers of glimpses of and identify and I think the Arts and Music will help us shape this as it becomes constructive