“Dharma: Interface between Secular and Sacred”
A Conference Investigating the Interface of Religion
with Literature, Media, Ethics, Law, Economics, Politics, Science and Philosophy
Dharmaram Vidya Kshetram, Bangalore, India
4-7 January 2015
“I cannot help seeing every problem from a religious point of view.” Ludwig Wittgenstein
40 years back, on the occasion of the Decennial of the Second Vatican Council, Journal of Dharma was launched by the Centre for the Study of World Religions (established in 1971) as an International Quarterly of World Religions ‘to fill the gap of a felt need in the contemporary society’ ‘to foster intercultural understanding from an inner realization of religions.’ Understanding religion as ‘one of the deepest dimensions of culture’ Journal of Dharma was committed to ‘disseminate the seeds of the Sacred in every bit of our secular existence and to re-integrate the entire material Universe in the Spirit of Truth and Holiness’ (Inaugural Editorial). Together with the promotion of inter-religious dialogue, Journal of Dharma also promoted a dialogue between the sacred and secular with the conviction that the ‘sacred’ and ‘secular’ are basic dimensions of reality.
The openness of the Catholic Church to other religions and the secular world in the twentieth century was largely the result of the deliberations of the Second Vatican Council, particularly the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, Gaudium et Spes and the Declaration on the Relation of the Church to Non-Christian Religions, Nostra Aetate. To mark the Golden Jubilee of the Second Vatican Council and the Ruby Jubilee of Journal of Dharma, we are organizing a Conference on “Dharma: Interface between Secular and Sacred.”
Questions of the engagement of the sacred in various secular fields of human endeavors like literature, ethics, politics, law, media, economics, science, and philosophy is quite complex and influential. In a world of mass human migration and ever faster dissemination of ideas and images, no fact of human life is independent of religious influence and it is also true religious life and practices are also influenced by these branches of human knowledge and life. Though these interactions are inevitable and often fruitful, they also generate sometimes serious tensions. In a world of specializations, the secular branches of culture like Literature, Media, Ethics, Law, Economics, Politics, Science and Philosophy often find the religious roots as irrelevant and sometimes harmful. It is also acknowledged, however, that human beings are religious today even in the wake of scientific and technological innovations and a market driven society. Human beings often want to relate their temporal and secular existence to something that is transcendental and sacred. “Dharma: Interface between Secular and Sacred” investigates the Interface of Religion with Literature, Media, Ethics, Law, Economics, Politics, Science and Philosophy. The Conference intends to bringing together experts and scholars from the respective fields to present the fruits of their research.
Selected papers presented will be published in the four issues of the Journal of Dharma in 2015 and eventually in a book form as an edited work.