Good historical background by Diana Butler Bass. It is in a 40-minute video, on a post on Diana’s “The Cottage” newsletter, which is hosted on Substack.
Three RUPTURES – not “disruptions” – have led us to now
I always tell folks that The Cottage is “part retreat, part think-tank.” The real cottage in my backyard is exactly that. I go there to pray, read, and get grounded. And it is where I think, write, and participate in online classes and podcasts.
Being “part retreat, part think-tank” is an odd combination. Most books, newsletters, and podcasts are about one or the other — about spirituality or about ideas. But the Cottage is about both inspiration and information.Because that’s who I am. For my entire life, I’ve been pushing deeper into the territory of heart and head, always learning more and letting questions lead me.
Since the U.S. election, I’ve been writing mostly to buoy your spirits by practicing joy, rediscovering gratitude, sinking into poetry, and holding up the wisdom of scripture. (Don’t worry — that continues.) Your response to all of this has been overwhelming! Wanting to buoy you, I buoyed myself, too.
Today, however, I want to switch things up and be Professor Diana.
For those of you who don’t know, my academic training was in American religious history, with sub-specialities in historical theology and (some) New Testament. During the first fourteen years of my career, I taught undergraduates and seminary students. I love to teach. I’m always teaching.
And I love history.
Today’s video isn’t a “spiritual pep talk” like last week. It is a history lecture. But here’s the thing: to me, history is a spiritual pep talk! Indeed, I often opine that history is a spiritual practice. History provides a bigger picture, reminds us of our ancestors’ courage (and failures), offers lessons to live better, and puts our lives in context.
If that’s not spiritual, I don’t know what is.
“Theology and Spirituality in Times of Rupture” (above) is a 40-minute talk I gave to the Southern Lights Conference three days before the Inauguration. In it, I suggest that three “ruptures” have shaped America in the last 120 years — with each rupture creating a new cultural pattern in which we live our lives. Each rupture has had profound impacts on every aspect of our experience — but especially the practices of politics and religion.
This lecture proposes a framework for understanding the last century that helps make sense of where we’ve been — and where we could go. Frameworks aren’t gospel. They are like video taken from drones — they get us above eye-level so we can see a larger landscape. Historians move back-and-forth between small pictures and big ones; sometimes we write about unique and discreet episodes in the past and, at other times, we see new or helpful patterns for the whole.
“Rupture” is a the latter type of history — about suggesting a pattern that has often hidden from us.
And it isn’t just a pattern of American history. These ruptures have shaped global history, especially the history of western democracies, as well.
This isn’t “boring” history. This is history as we’re living it. I think that you’ll be stunned by the ending. You can’t hear it in the video, but the audience collectively gasped. You could literally feel the power of a shared “aha” moment at the conference. Southern Lights rarely shares full videos beyond the community. I insisted that we open up this one lecture so you could see it. I think it will help.I know 40 minutes is a time commitment, but please, please listen. It is important. You can share it with your friends or book group or adult ed classes by sharing this post. The video is not available for wider public viewing anywhere but here (it isn’t on YouTube or Vimeo).