The Challenge .....

The challenge for humanism in the 21st century is to make it all embracing by helping to develop a self-discovery and compassionate culture on a global level. Those secular champions of modernity who want the world to conform to a single dimension of progress are now as regressive and restricting as the religious fundamentalist who champions what they consider to be a revealed creed in a total way. Both are compelled by inflexible conviction. And like the opposing forces of communism and fascism in the early 20th Century had much in common, so these apparently divergent forces of religious fundamentalism and fanatic modernity also have much in common. Their battle like the religious wars of the 17th century could be devastating to a world with weapons of mass destruction.

The alternative culture to such forces of potential destruction is the humanistic one that includes people of all religions and none but who embrace humanistic values as the basis of their actions. These are values of global compassion, personal self-discovery, shared development, planetary concern and a love of community. This is the culture that needs to be fostered in society to prevent the twin dangers of religious fundamentalism and fanatic modernity consuming us all.