Campus & Community

Religious authority to speak about happiness at Bridges to the Future event

José Casanova, a leading authority on religion and world affairs, will speak at the University of Denver Bridges to the Future event at Davis Auditorium in Sturm Hall April 22 at 7 p.m.

Casanova is a sociology professor and senior fellow in the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs at Georgetown University and author of Public Religions in the Modern World(University of Chicago Press, 1994).

His speech, “Religion, Globalization and the Pursuit of Happiness,” will continue DU’s look at how we pursue happiness in the midst of tough ongoing issues like war and pollution.

“The pursuit of happiness is not an exclusively American idea,” Casanova says. “What is peculiarly American is the extreme individualist and activist interpretation of the principle of the pursuit of happiness.”

Casanova says what is even more peculiarly American is the fusion between the pursuit of happiness and religion.

“There seems to be no tension between religious and secular happiness, and the pursuit of happiness itself becomes a religious principle and a religious goals for most Americans,” he says.

During his lecture, Casanova will address what the pursuit of happiness means to the community as a whole. Additionally, he will ask how the pursuit of happiness applies in a global society with a wide variety of religious beliefs.

Casanova’s research during the last two decades has been focused on the dynamics of religious revival and of inter-religious encounters and conflicts.

The event is at capacity, so no further reservations will be accepted; however, live video streaming will be offered atwww.du.edu/bridges.

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