Sacred Paths to Magnanimity in a Polarized World

Around the globe, there are robust examples of communities built on a resonant language of moral commitment, bolstered often by religious ritual, that sacralizes openness, inclusivity, a just social equality, and a respect for science, including social science, for providing means to achieve these. These are models for community that can translate between the universalistic, impersonal languages of expertise and the redolent languages of fidelity to particular persons in accordance with sacred traditions, which unite people from different social classes and ethnicities and enable them to see themselves as part of a sacred whole without shutting themselves off from other communities but engaging with diverse others in a quest for the common good. Here I explore three examples, one Catholic, the second, Buddhist, and the third “secular” but with sacred commitments grounded in the civic republican tradition. They all build bridges between class, race, gender, and religion and they all bring a strong moral voice to dialogues with science and politics.