Americans are sad and lonely, and we don’t feel like we belong. With depression and “deaths of despair” on the rise, over half of us say that no one knows us well—a truly alarming statistic that doesn’t bode well for our future. As if matters weren’t bad enough, we’re not just sad and alone—we’re becoming more mean to each other, and it’s likely part of the same cycle of pain. With fewer human connections in our lives, more of us seek belonging in our venally angry civic life, so this crisis of belonging also fuels extremism for which violence is increasingly a downstream outcome. What if, at its core, the loneliness, bitterness, and anger is a failure of our society’s moral compass?
We asked The God Squad to read David Brooks' Atlantic piece “How America Got Mean” before this conversation, but whether you've had a chance to read it or not, you're going to be inspired by this conversation.
Meet the God Squad, the brains behind our series “God Squad: Improbable conversations for people of faith and no faith at all (because talking politics wasn’t hard enough). Joining us for this edition of God Squad:
Joining us for this God Squad are Father Tim Holeda of St. Thomas More Co-Cathedral, Dr. Gary Shultz of First Baptist Church, Rev. Betsy Ouellette-Zierden, Joseph Davis Jr. of Truth Gatherers Community Church, Rabbi Paul Sidlofsky of Temple Israel. The Reverend Dr. Latricia Scriven of St. Paul’s United Methodist Church facilitates the conversation.
Find bios for our participants and a full program description online here.
The Village Square is a proud member of The Democracy Group, a network of podcasts that examines what's broken in our democracy and how we can work together to fix it.
Funding for this podcast was provided through a grant from Florida Humanities with funds from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Any views, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of Florida Humanities or the National Endowment for the Humanities.
This program is part of a larger project "Healing Starts Here" funded by New Pluralists. Learn more about our project, and other inspiring grantees here.
Jonathan Haidt: The Anxious Generation
UNUM Series: The Soul of Civility
Fragile Neighborhoods with Dr. Seth Kaplan
God Squad: Everyone is Canceled!
Dr. Jonathan Haidt | After Babel: "The Fragmentation of Everything"
The Big Sort with Bill Bishop
Being Human in Divided Times: A fireside chat with Village Square founder Liz Joyner
Rachel Brown: The Roots of Belonging & The Risks of Othering
Stephen P. Kiernan: Authentic Patriotism
God Squad: Shut Up and (Don't) Sing
Dr. Todd Rose | Collective Illusions: Conformity, Complicity and the Science of Why We Make Bad Decisions
Robert Putnam & Shaylyn Romney Garrett | Join or Die: Why you should join a club — and why the fate of America depends on it
The Way Out: Overcoming Toxic Polarization, with Dr. Peter T. Coleman
TP&R Feed Drop | Tim Keller and Michael Gerson, A Tribute with Pete Wehner and Jonathan Rauch
When the People Decide Feed Drop | Libraries as civic spaces
How Do We Fix It Feed Drop | The Middle 70%. In This Together: Bill Shireman
Let's Find Common Ground Feed Drop | Patriotism: Pride, Race and Reckoning
Democracy Works Feed Drop: Separating News From Noise
TP&R Feed Drop: Bob Cusack, Editor in Chief at THE HILL
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
The Modern West
Voices of Misery Podcast
House of Whimsical Terror
Just Dumb Enough Podcast
Stuff You Should Know
Timcast IRL