Abstract
Societies are undergoing an intensive process of transformation, and the role that religion plays in guiding such rapid changes remains underexplored. In recent decades, postmodern discourse has hindered the attractiveness of involvement in religious affairs and reading sacred books, highlighting how “uncool” and useless these practices are in responding to current daily life challenges. Decades of research have evidenced the positive impact of reading the most precious universal literary creations. Since sacred books are considered universal texts, this study explores the potential of dialogic interreligious gatherings (DIGs) focused on sacred books to enhance the attractiveness of key values such as love, kindness, humility, and generosity. These spaces are grounded in strong principles that guarantee the freedom of participants. This context opens up a possibility of discussing sacred books in a dialogic and egalitarian space where everyone’s voice is heard. In this context, especially in times where freedom is jeopardized in many spheres, believers from different faiths and nonbelievers engage in dialogues and relate sacred book content to their personal experiences and current social challenges. The communicative analysis conducted shows that DIGs drive the attractiveness of fundamental values present in sacred books, creating possibilities to enhance their effects in spurring personal and social change.
Highlights
The current society is immersed in an intense process of transformation, in which globalization has a key role in increasing resistance to national identity, secularization, and postsecularization processes (Höllinger and Muckenhuber 2019)
Postmodern discourse has hindered the attractiveness of involvement in religious affairs and reading sacred books, highlighting how “uncool” and useless these practices are in responding to current daily life challenges
Since sacred books are considered universal texts, this study explores the potential of dialogic interreligious gatherings (DIGs) focused on sacred books to enhance the attractiveness of key values such as love, kindness, humility, and generosity
Summary
The current society is immersed in an intense process of transformation, in which globalization has a key role in increasing resistance to national identity, secularization, and postsecularization processes (Höllinger and Muckenhuber 2019). The current pandemic has affected the health sphere and the cultural and social realms (Boas 2020) At this particular point, social support manifested in values such as solidarity and friendship has already been shown to play a key role in overcoming the challenges of current society (Anderson and Fowers 2020; García-Yeste et al 2020; Giner 2011; Leon-Jimenez 2020; Merodio et al 2020; Umberson et al 2010). Social support manifested in values such as solidarity and friendship has already been shown to play a key role in overcoming the challenges of current society (Anderson and Fowers 2020; García-Yeste et al 2020; Giner 2011; Leon-Jimenez 2020; Merodio et al 2020; Umberson et al 2010) Such values have been widely demonstrated to have a positive impact in a range of social spheres and in terms of wellbeing, postmodern discourse has actively argued how useless love, kindness, and solidarity are in response to current daily life challenges (Hooks 1999). Far from this discourse, other authors have stated that this process might be strongly grounded in values linked to religiosity, since it might provide meaning to one’s life from its strong empowering and motivational functions (Ciarrochi and Heaven 2012; Emmons 2005)
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