The website of the Journal of Inter-Religious Studies

“Building a New Global Commons: Religious Diversity and the Challenge for Higher Education,” By Victor Kazanjian, James P. Keen, and Peter Laurence

The ideas and processes that we explore seek to illustrate a different paradigm, one in which the educational enterprise offers students the experience of reconstructing themselves in ways that make them better at encountering difference and discovering ways that lead to collaboration rather than necessarily to conflict. Such an educational paradigm would invite the identity-forming narratives of each person into the commons where they are recognized in such a way that the space of the commons becomes a place of dialogue and interaction, of encounter and conversation, of essential conflict, but conflict that ultimately seeks a common cause. One dilemma that persists in higher education is the place of religion in college and university education and the challenges and opportunities posed by increasing religious diversity on campuses nationwide.