A Poetics of Peace~The Tides of Chaos, The Search for Meaning

"Finding meaning in contemporary life means avoiding the trap of cynicism as well as the prison of simple belief. Amidst mass confusion, the soul winds its ancient, wily way to meaning and purpose." - Michael Meade

As America remains battered between war in the Persian Gulf and massive flooding on the Gulf Coast, meaning drowns in a surge of hypocrisy and hubris. Levees fail, cultural imagination collapses and the 'soul to soul' connections break simultaneously. The increasing sense of chaos, the loss of soulful connection and absence of the sacred feed a mix of cultural anxiety and despair that festers under the surface of life.

People increasingly become bit players in dramas where technology and bureaucracy take center stage. Despite high-speed connections there are more and more disconnects with an increasing separation between the empty center and the excessive surface of modern mass societies.

Experience alone, no matter how tragic cannot produce meaning. Rather, penetrating the surface and reflecting on the depths revealed is required to engage the mythic imagination and human meaning hidden below the storms of reality. In times of crisis, it is still the individual human life through which genuine questions are formed and from which vital answers must be sought.

From Noah and the 'great flood,' to the mythology of storm gods and the Titans ripping at the edges of culture Michael Meade will offer an evening of stories that seek to rescue meaning from the turbulence and chaos of modern times.

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