The Religion of Tomorrow
A Vision for the Future of the Great Traditions - More Inclusive, More Comprehensive, More Complete
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- £19.99
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- £19.99
Publisher Description
A provocative examination of how the great religious traditions can remain relevant in modern times by incorporating scientific truths learned about human nature over the last century
A single purpose lies at the heart of all the great religious traditions: awakening to the astonishing reality of the true nature of ourselves and the universe. At the same time, through centuries of cultural accretion and focus on myth and ritual as ends in themselves, this core insight has become obscured.
Here, Ken Wilber provides a path for re-envisioning a religion of the future that acknowledges the evolution of humanity in every realm while remaining faithful to that original spiritual vision. For the traditions to attract modern men and women, Wilber asserts, they must incorporate the extraordinary number of scientific truths learned about human nature in just the past hundred years—for example, about the mind and brain, emotions, and the growth of consciousness—that the ancients were simply unaware of and thus were unable to include in their meditative systems.
Taking Buddhism as an example, Wilber demonstrates how his comprehensive Integral Approach—which is already being applied to several world religions by some of their adherents—can avert a “cultural disaster of unparalleled proportions”: the utter neglect of the glorious upper reaches of human potential by the materialistic postmodern worldview. Moreover, he shows how we can apply this approach to our own spiritual practice. This, his most sweeping work since Sex, Ecology, Spirituality, is a thrilling call for wholeness, inclusiveness, and unity in the religions of tomorrow.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Wilbur (The Integral Vision) explains in detail how integrating the knowledge and spirituality that humans have developed over the millennia in fields as diverse as science, psychology, and religion creates what he calls a Fourth Turning that can lead humans to a new wholeness. As this wholeness expands, he writes, society will achieve new levels of compassion, peace, and inclusion. His vision includes growing up (head knowledge), waking up (soul knowledge), cleaning up (psychological baggage), and showing up (attending to integrating). This ambitious faith vision synthesizes a vast amount of information in graspable schemas, such as the four quadrants of perception and the stages of spiritual growth. While traditions such as empiricism and Eastern and Western religions have each privileged only one form of knowing, Wilbur contends that when people confront their shadow sides and spirituality becomes an integral part of all knowing and being, humankind will leap forward and this book hopes to guide us along the path. Wilbur is clearly a passionate teacher, but he tends to repeat himself. A vision as optimistic as his could benefit from being condensed for greater accessibility.
