Christian higher education in fractured societies: Societal challenges and agapeic wisdom

Abstract

In this opening lecture for the 2022 Budapest Conference on “Building Community in Fractured Societies: Challenges for Christians in Higher Education,” an overview is given of recent societal developments, (geo-) political, economic, ecological, sociological, psychological, and spiritual. A basic framework is presented on how to analyze today's, late-modern world. It is a world in which instrumental rationality is highly dominant. Next to this, powerful societal complexes exert deep influence on the lives of humans: political, economic, media, and medical. Over against this is posed the “real human world” of meaning and responsibility, as the key focus of Christian higher education.