15 March 2010

The conference on spiritual life came to a close

On March 11, the Spiritual Life in A Free Society: Twenty Years of Freedom of Religion conference came to a successful end. The conference was hosted by the Hussite Theological Faculty and the Dingir Magazine and took place in the two auditoriums of the faculty on March 10–11, 2010. The schedule was packed and went on to late evening on both days.

On the first day, representatives of Czech churches and religious organizations spoke about the lives of their communities during the past 20 years. Not only Christians took the floor (represented by Cardinal Miroslav Vlk on behalf of the Roman Catholic Church, Patriarch Tomáš Butta on behalf of the Czechoslovak Hussite Church and Synod Senior Jan Ruml of the Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren), but also the Jews (represented by Rabbi Karol Sidon), the Muslims, Hinduists, Buddhists, and representatives of the esoteric and New Age traditions were present, among others. Among the most popular were the afternoon debates and the evening panel discussion. At the end of the first day, Barbora Baranová and Tomáš Novotný performed old Jewish songs. The atmosphere of the day was joyful and full of interest in each other's spiritual philosophies and respect for the respective traditions.

On Thursday, March 11, the spiritual life in the past 20 years was reflected from the academic point of view, with 16 talks by prominent speakers from the fields of religion studies, theology and sociology of religion, such as Pavel Hošek, Dušan Lužný, Zdeněk R. Nešpor, Karel Skalický, Vladimír Šiler, Ivan O. Štampach a další. Speakers from Slovakia also contributed.

Selected talks will be published in June, in the Dingir magazine, issue 2/2010.

Translation: Jaroslav Švelch