Witness to Emergence
December 15, 2015 Kosmos Community News
By Alnoor Ladha
The Collapse of Western Civilization
Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway
Columbia University Press, 2014
Terra Nova: Global Revolution and the Healing of Love
Dieter Duhm
Verlag Meiga Press, 2015
Two recent books provide striking contrasts in their modality of intervention.
Samina Faheem Sundas, a Sunni Muslim woman originally from Pakistan living in the United States, is the founder of American Muslim Voice, a grassroots organization that seeks to foster lifelong friendships between Muslims and all communities through interfaith dialogue.
In light of recent terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Kosmos spoke with Samina Sundas about the backlash against Muslims in the mainstream media and why intercultural understanding is now more important than ever.
The five most popular articles this year in Kosmos Journal together form an interesting family. All five in some way focus the lens of the Sacred on core topics, such as nature, science and community.
Here are the opening paragraphs of each one, in the order of most-read:
by Dot Maver
Ambassador Anwarul Chowdhury, Former Under-Secretary-General and High Representative of the UN dares to ask the question, “Is Peace A Human Right,” and in this interview offers history and perspective on the significant recent UN Resolution in support of a Culture of Peace.
By Jo Ellen Green Kaiser
KOSMOS JOURNAL FALL | WINTER 2015
“To truly transform the news ecosystem, we will need to take positive action. Both community journalism and collaborative newsmaking face their own challenges. Community journalists can post their content, but increasingly Facebook and Google control who sees content online. Their algorithms determine what appears when you look at your feed or search a keyword. Too many stories are still hidden because we simply can’t hear the voices of the people telling them.”
by Joni Carley, DMin
Omega Institute’s 2015 Forum on the Commons focused on literal and philosophical seeds and also on developing the civic soil for bringing all seeds to their fullest fruition. Extraordinary people including Vandana Shiva, Maude Barlow, Ralph Nader, Winona LaDuke, John Todd, Will Allen and others talked about successes and challenges of a commons-centric systems, programs, policies, traditions and technologies.