American Culture and Confucianism

On Saturday, December 30, the Metropolitan Opera broadcast a live production of the Magic Flute to movie theaters across America. The Cinemark theater in Plano called Tinseltown was, to my understanding, the only venue in the Dallas metroplex. Cinemark put the Magic Flute in on one screen and it sold out. Then they added a 2nd screen and sold that out. I was lucky to get tickets.

As I listened to Sarastro sing how knowledge and virtue would uplift humanity, I realized he was singing about Confucian ideas.

There is much in Western and American culuture that is compatible with Confucian culture. In my Yahoo group I have many Western examples of Confucian ideals. Robert Owen, for example, manifested Confucian ideals.

Confucianism will be the new wave in American culture.

Robert

Propriety and Graduations

I went to my neice's college graduation recently. I was surprised by the poor behavior of some of the students.

Some students were whooping and hollering during a violin perfomance. The violinist was a graduating senior who was graduating summa cum laude with a 4.0 average. He was playing a complicated and challenging piece for the audience and you could not hear his playing over some of the hollering by some jerks.

Then the president of the university went to the microphone and told the students this was not a basketball game, but the rude behavior continued. Those students had no concept of appropriate behavior.

Confucians, I thought to myself, would not act like that -- cat-calling during an artist's performance. Propriety, Li, is a Confucian virtue. The Confucian tradition, also called the Ru Jia tradition, has a lot to offer America.

Robert

How I got Hooked on Confucianism

I read a couple of books on Confucianism and was very impressed. The ideas were solid. I was very impressed that Confucius never claimed to have received his ideas as a revelation from god. Then I read "Boston Confucianism" by Robert Cummings Neville. This book presented the idea that a person could be a Christian and a Confucianist. I had to agree that I saw no conflict.

Neville's book made reference to books by a professor named Tu Weiming (sometimes spelled Tu Wei-ming). I read one of Dr. Tu's books and found it intriguing. Other professors made Confucianism seem like a relic from the past. Dr. Tu made it seem alive. I have read many of his books and I was hooked.

Now, Confucianism is not only alive to me, it seems to me to offer great hope for moving our country forward. We need to bring a commitment to ethical behavior back into the public dialogue. Confucianism, viewed as a philosophy or an ethical system, is well suited for public discussion.

Now I am promoting Confucianism for Americans.

Robert

Confucianism in America

I have not seen a blog about Confucianism in America, so I am starting this one.

I have a strong interest in Confucianism (Ru Jia). I ran for my local school board on a platform of Confucianist educational principles.

I've started a website to promote the application of Confucian principles, like the love of learning. The URL is:

http://www.timelesswayfoundation.org/

More later. I look forward to hearing your comments.

Robert