Authenticity
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Authenticity Under Threat, Part 2: Alienation in Mass Society
As we saw from Part 1 in this series of posts (which I encourage you to read before going on), our current systems of knowledge and power are not so much concerned with the authentic identity of concrete persons (you and I). Those systems are primarily concerned with objects of study including such commonplace perspectives… Continue reading
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Authenticity Under Threat: an Existential Response Part 1
Existentialism offers neither attractions nor peril to people who are perfectly convinced that they are headed in the right direction, that they possess the means to attain a reasonably perfect happiness, and that they have a divine mandate to remove anyone who seems inclined to interfere with this aim. Existentialism calls into question the validity,… Continue reading
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Evangelicalism and Conservatism: From Doctrine Back to Disposition
If you have been paying attention, you will notice that there have been two particular examples of fragmentation that have coincided with each other, a fragmentation of the conservative movement, and a fragmenting of evangelical Christianity. In the heart of conservatism, there is a disagreement between the centrists who have complex sensitivities and more radical… Continue reading
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The Human Person and History in the Age of Mass Reproduction
That which withers in the age of mass reproduction is the authenticity of the individual. Continue reading
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Post-Easter: Resurrection
The most valid intuition of the “religionless religion” is their awareness that the vast majority of people today, i.e., those who “cannot believe”, are encountering Christ, even though they cannot adjust to the idea that life acquires meaning only when one “joins the Church”. Continue reading
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Hannah Arendt: Politics – Authenticity, Mass Society and the Private Realm
Arendt invokes the realm of privacy, which is the realm of persons who are significant others to the individual. These significant others are the context for the emergence of an individual. In other words, the realm of privacy includes our social sphere where each of those significant others has a reciprocal relationship with each other. … Continue reading
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A Ritual Nurturing of Freedom
“…with the surprising eradication of relatively unconscious structures that housed and empowered a certain inspiring model of human flourishing, we may want to reconsider how we have housed and empowered human flourishing.” Continue reading
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The Crack in our Oppression
The mass-market hegemony resists the moral examination of the world that could stand up to the use of arbitrary power that we have seen with our eyes and have heard with our ears. Continue reading
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Hannah Arendt and Hope in Dark Times: a Ground of Action
Natality is the condition for continued human existence, it is the miracle of birth, it is the new beginning inherent in each birth that makes action possible, it is spontaneous and it is unpredictable. Continue reading
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The Freedom Convoy: Peckford’s Self-defeating Argument
Mr. Peckford and Mr. Trudeau advocate a happy individual who is ripe for manipulation… Continue reading
About me: I am a career educator and traveler at heart. My written work includes academic writing in philosophy and linguistics, English acquisition, and most intently in the areas of spiritual engagement with reality and what that means for our public lives.
My education is a mixture of formal study in philosophy, political theory, Biblical studies, and history, along with professional teaching certification in TESOL and in cognitive testing, and international teaching.
My travel experiences include a range of countries in Asia, Europe, Africa and North America. I have lived in Canada, the United States, Germany, Saudi Arabia, South Korea and Thailand. From those places I have traveled to many others besides.
I am a child of the 70’s and a “family man.” That means I have two wonderful kids who have been round the world with me.
Lastly, I am married to a wonderful woman since 2004. She is my partner, my friend, and my muse.
Thanks again for stopping by,
Raymond Klassen - Ideals and Identities 