1 post tagged “individualism”
It's hard to argue with Grandma.
Of the many "wise sayings," she often told me, one came to mind the other day as I was helping a neighbor clean: "if everyone swept in front of his own front door, the whole world would be clean."
Problem is, though, sometimes others can't sweep in front of their own front door.
So as true as my grandmother's old proverb is, its radical emphasis on the individual ignores the power of, and central significance of, the community.
In the end, neither the individual, nor the community, can exist without the other.
Philosophers have long struggled to answer, or solve, this problem of individual vs community, also known by the technical term, "the problem of the one and the many."
Some theologians have argued that this "problem" can only be solved with the historic orthodox concept of God as "three-and-one."
Sweeping, as it turns out, is a project for the Trinity.
