Santa Clara University

Philosophy of Suffering & Solidarity (PHIL 151)

5 upper-division quarter units

Instructor: Mark Ravizza, SJ

Language of Instruction: English

There are many types and kinds of call,
  but the core of the experience is always the same:
your soul is awakened, transformed, or exalted,
so that instead of dreams and presentiments from within,
a summons comes from without—
a portion of reality presents itself and makes a claim.

                                                            --Hermann Hesse

It is necessary to educate ourselves to endure the unexpected.
But it is a terrible thing not to be able to expect.
Thus it is necessary to keep together, in one struggling act of the imagination,
the expected and the unexpected.

                                                            --William Lynch

What is wanting, apparently, is the tragic imagination that . . .
permits great loss to be recognized, suffered and borne,
and that makes possible some sort of consolation and renewal . . .
Without the return we may know innocence and horror and grief,
but not tragedy and joy.
Not consolation or forgiveness or redemption.

                                                            --Wendell Barry

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Description:

How ought we to live in a world marked by suffering and injustice?  How should we interpret the chance meetings and interconnections that shape our lives?  Can such moments help reveal what life is calling us to do and be?  What role does a religious imagination play in our postmodern world, especially when we are faced with pain, violence, and disappointment?  This course will begin to address these questions by exploring how we try to find meaning in a world filled with contingency and injustice.  Using a variety of sources including theological and philosophical essays, film, and literature, we will examine how one critically engages experiences of interconnection, solidarity, and suffering, and uses such experiences to discern one’s vocation and calling. 

Required Texts:

Annie Dillard, An Annie Dillard Reader (hereafter designated “[ADR]”)

John L’Heureux, The Shrine at Altamira

Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Jerome Miller, The Way of Suffering: A Geography of Crisis

Josef Pieper, On Hope

Course Reader (hereafter designated “[CR]”)