Religious Futures: Forecasting the Next Chapters in the Story of Humanity
Wednesday, December 14
1050 Jenkins Nanovic Halls | Zoom Webinar
5 – 6 p.m. ET reception
6 – 7:30 pm ET panel discussion
What will the world look like in thirty years? A Pew Research report forecasts a more populous planet in 2050, with as many Muslims as Christians. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts that absent radical action, global temperature will rise another half degree Celsius, further intensifying our slow-motion global disaster. But utopian thought leaders on the other hand envision gender equality, electric cars, designer genes, and the elimination of global poverty. This December, a group of academics, journalists, and faith leaders visits for a workshop on how to reshape the public conversation about religion. Their meeting focuses on religion’s roles for predicting, shaping, and adapting to what the future has in store.
How should academics, faith leaders, and journalists inform the public about how religious individuals and institutions take the “long view” by envisioning what has not yet come to pass? What are the next chapters in the story of humanity, and how long, joyful, or arduous might they be? And whose stories of the future should be circulated more widely?
Faith seems ever more present in the national conversation about our shared future, but are there better ways to talk about it? Have our professions helped the public come to grips with the next chapters in the story of humanity? In this discussion, several of our workshop participants will share with us what they have discerned.
Presented by the Ansari Institute for Global Engagement with Religion, with support from the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations.
Photo by Drew Beamer on Unsplash
Speakers
Scott Appleby
Marilyn Keough Dean
Keough School of Global Affairs
Celene Ibrahim
Faculty Member
Groton School
Jack Jenkins
National Reporter
Religion News Service
Shannon Rivers
Member, Akimel O’otham (River People) Nation
Indigenous Peoples Human Rights Activist
Sarah Ventre (Moderator)
Audio Journalist & Religion Reporter
Producer & Editor