McGill philosopher Charles Taylor (Catholic) wins $1M Berggruen Prize

Oct 12, '16, 5:00 pm

Dwyer Regular Member Join Date: February 26, 2007 Posts: 1,361 Religion: Byzantine Catholic

McGill philosopher Charles Taylor (Catholic) wins $1M Berggruen Prize Quote: Taylor, a McGill University professor emeritus, is a leading voice for Canadian unity and the preservation of Quebec's distinct identity. He is also a household name in the province for having co-chaired, with sociologist and historian Gérard Bouchard, the Bouchard-Taylor commission, which explored the "reasonable accommodation'' of religious minorities . . . Its founder paid tribute to Taylor, 84, who was chosen by an independent jury and was selected because of his contributions to various social sciences, public affairs and humanities. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montre...rize-1.3792438 Quote: When Hungarian students in October 1956 revolted against the country's Stalinist regime, Charles Taylor, then a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, took off for Budapest to help, much like a firefighter responding to a burning house . . . A Secular Age is a highly nuanced "master narrative" of philosophy, history, ideas, literature, science and religion that stakes claim to a middle ground where Taylor uncovers the complexities and "fragilization" of modern life. There is, he notes, good and bad among secularist humanist camps and the wide array of religious beliefs . . . 'Taylor succeeds in no less than recasting the entire debate about secularism,' Bellah says in a blog. He adds that Taylor 'is clear from the beginning that he writes as a believing Catholic: He believes that the Christian effort to reinvent itself as part of the new secular world is a positive event. Yet he is merciless as to its many failings.'" http://www.northwestern.edu/magazine...re/taylor.html I don't know much about this thinker; Mr. Taylor ran as a social democrat New Democratic Party (NDP) candidate, which is a Canadian political party to the left of the Liberal Party, several times in the 1960s but lost the elections. The Berggruen Institute appears to be a Globalist think tank managed by former bigwig politicians and famous economists. There are some red flags, but anyway, he says he's Catholic and I'm glad he won. __________________ "It's a free country; you can say whatever you want." --Old American Saying (U.S. Postal Service stamp-- from 1977 Americana series which extols freedom of speech and features a Speaker's Stand decorated with an American Flag shield.)