The Table Video

Principles for Economic and Political Flourishing – Stacey Floyd-Thomas & Miroslav Volf – CCT Table Conference Q&A – Resilience: Growing Stronger Through Struggle.

Transcript:

I think the first step, obviously, would be to do a thorough inventory of our own religious practices and beliefs. Simply put. When we talk about American versions of Christianity for instance, they always give themselves over to Calvinist Orthodoxy or Protestant work ethic that lends itself to what Gandhi calls one of the world’s greatest blunders, wealth without work.

I mean exactly how do we make the suffering of others our spiritual discipline, is the question we need to ask? And by asking those reflective questions, that displaces us but looks at what our agency actually creates in the lives of others. Is the way that we are able to link our spiritual aspirations with our social realities?

And so I really think it’s just kind of as flat-footed as that. Start asking the critical questions of how am I complicit in what is killing me? How am I complicit in my own soul murder? And then we’ll realize that it’s often by the way in which we do wrong in the name of God on the other bodies while we prop ourselves up, legitimate ourselves, and justify ourselves. [gentle music]