This video is a part of the Healing the Heart of Democracy Discussion Guide and can be found with more videos and resources in our “Healing the Heart of Democracy Hub.” You can explore the hub, download the guide, and find all of the videos along with additional resources here.
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If I were asked for two words to summarize the habits of the heart American citizens need in response to twenty-first-century conditions, chutzpah and humility are the words I would choose. By chutzpah I mean knowing that I have a voice that needs to be heard and the right to speak it. By humility I mean accepting the fact that my truth is always partial and may not be true at all— so I need to listen with openness and respect, especially to “the other,” as much as I need to speak my own voice with clarity and conviction. Humility plus chutzpah equals the kind of citizens a democracy needs. (43)
Q. Do you have the chutzpah to speak your voice clearly, and the humility to listen to others openly, in the ongoing effort to create “a politics worthy of the human spirit”? What might help you and others develop those capacities more fully?
Carrie: If you read the news, or you’re aware of what’s happening in the world, pretty quickly you can start thinking, “Wow, it’s a scary place.” And it’s true that there are so many sorrows out there and there’s a lot of work to be done. And at the same time, I feel very hopeful that everywhere I go, in every community I visit, there are people working very hard to make their community, to make the world, a better, kinder place. They don’t always get the front page—sometimes they don’t even get the back page. But I’m encouraged by the fact that in every single community I visit, they’re there. They’re there and they’re working in large and small ways. There’s still this hope that the world is still filled with fine people.
Parker: [The world] is in our hands, isn’t it? To hold with courage and with love. . . . (Excerpt from video)
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Thank you for taking time to reflect on these questions and explore these topics. Thank you for being one of the people who understands that “the world is in our hands” and for the work you do to make your community and our world “a better, kinder place.”
