There is much hue and cry around the liberal ideas among many in the society, especially those in religious and familial power roles, as they see their monopoly in defining and explaining life and societal roles get dismantled. This makes them extremely insecure about themselves, families, and community roles. Should we really be afraid of the onset of liberal ideals in families, educational systems, religious spheres, and political consciences? A blunt rejection of liberal ideas in view of certain moral deterioration will not produce the desired result. Or the real question would be how far we will be fighting the liberal ideas- which have historically been there for a few centuries- at a time when AI has taken hold of our younger and future generations.
The saddest part of those in hierarchical positions is their uncanny attempts to reverse time and generations so as to protect their institutionalist ambitions. It further exhibits their disbelief in their own systems of thought and belief. A modest reaction would be ‘How can we get along or dialogue with liberal ideas in our contexts rather than to anathemize it?’
Religions very often appeal to authority over personal freedom, moral absolutes over individual choices, uniformity over pluralism, and historical redundancy over organic reforms, whereas the liberal ideas favour the vice versa.
Alexis de Tocqueville offers a critical framework to liberal societal living and religious culture in a democratic world order in his Democracy in America. Yet he also observes “But by a singular concourse of events, religion is entangled in those institutions which democracy assails, and it is not unfrequently brought to reject the equality it loves, and to curse that cause of liberty as a foe which it might hallow by its alliance.” The implication for religious leaders is the need for a dose of healthy self-criticism, a term of Pope Francis.
Reading Tocqueville will help us understand whether we are afraid of losing faith or simply the inherited privileges. And are we insecure when people no longer require religious fatwas to decide and discern their destiny? I think these fears overlap, and such fears are not theological reasons to discredit people’s attempt to reclaim their autonomy. Francis famously stated in Amoris Laetitia that the Church “is called to form conscience, not to replace them.”
Therefore, as and when time unfolds various liberal movements in society, we must take assurance in the sacred texts we hold on to, rather than dishearten ourselves and accompany the fellow brethren in goodwill in their attempts to find an equal, dignified, and autonomous mode of living and expressing the mysteries of life.
