6 Quotes Tagged: modern-world

The issue is not simply one of needing to save the world, but also of needing to solve the problem of the loss of soul throughout the modern world. Part of what has been lost in the reckless rushing of modernity is the sense that each life has an authentic interior that shelters important emotions as well as inherent purpose, and that the dignity of existence includes a necessary instinct to unfold the unique story woven inside each living soul.

Frost kills the flowers that bloom out of season...

My own sense is that the acquisition of self knowledge has been made difficult by the modern world. More and more human beings live in vast urban environments, surrounded by other human beings and the creations of human beings. The natural world, the traditional source of self-awareness, is increasingly absent.

The modern world is not evil; in some ways the modern world is far too good. It is full of wild and wasted virtues. When a religious scheme is shattered (as Christianity was shattered at the Reformation), it is not merely the vices that are let loose. The vices are, indeed, let loose, and they wander and do damage. But the virtues are let loose also; and the virtues wander more wildly, and the virtues do more terrible damage. The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other and are wandering alone. Thus some scientists care for truth; and their truth is pitiless. Thus some humanitarians only care for pity; and their pity (I am sorry to say) is often untruthful.

What is most lacking in the modern world of duplications and facsimiles, of endless information and intentional misinformation, is the authenticity that makes life truly meaningful and spiritually rewarding.

Para mí es mucho mejor captar el universo como es en realidad que persistir en el engaño, por muy satisfactorio y reconfortante que sea. ¿Qué actitud es la que nos equipa mejor para sobrevivir a largo plazo? ¿Qué nos da una mayor influencia en nuestro futuro? Y si nuestra ingenua autoconfianza queda un poco socavada en el proceso, ¿es tan grande la pérdida, en realidad? ¿No hay motivo para darle la bienvenida como una experiencia que hace madurar e imprime carácter?