Clusters of Concerns for the Roundtable

 

WHAT?
What is authenticity? What are the components of authenticity? What are the contested meanings of authenticity? Is being authentic based on values/virtues/ meanings only applicable to you or your community or is it based on universal values/virtues/meanings embracing all? Is being authentic a private and/or public matter?  Is being authentic political or spiritual?

BEING/DOING?
What does it mean when one says "be authentic in what you are or doing?" What does it mean to be authentic as a teacher or a human rights activist or a person promoting inter-faith action or politician? For instance, can anybody really be involved in inter-faith (or any other) work or only a special category of persons for it to be authentic? Is being authentic 'costly' for an individual or community? Is just doing something marked as socially good being authentic?  Can we be authentic at an individual level and yet be problematic at the collective level?

FAKE WORLD?
Are many of the local and global problems today partly, if not fully,  caused by humans not being authentic? How can we explain the level of corruption or fraud in the world? How does this work in the contexts of a world that is increasingly influenced by being 'fake'? Is being fake of more practical value than being authentic? 

AUTHENTICITY AND ITS FUTURE?
Can being authentic support the cause of and the action for peace, sustainability and compassion in a compromised, broken world? Is it necessary? Does not really matter for our day to day life? Are there ways to create or live an authentic life ?