Convictions

This year, as a way to open up our thinking about Paul Loeb's Soul of a Citizen, I have asked students to create a list of their core convictions--their deepest abiding beliefs--that ground their being. I too list my convictions.

It's an interesting question: What are your core beliefs, your convictions?

Here is my list, in no particular order, which I know is incomplete, and yet it's a good starting point:

1. Justice: I believe that we should strive for justice and pursue justice for everyone, that every human being deserves justice.

2. Life is good and we should repect it, support it, nurture it.

3. I believe in choice.

4. I believe in open-mindedness, that we should foster free and open thinking, and that we need to expect open-mindedness in everyone.

5. I believe in the fundamental right to human expression.

6. I believe in the pursuit of truth, especially the pursuit of truth over dogma or unexamined and/or received truths.

7. I believe that every human being has integrity.

8. I believe that we need to live (as much as possible) in balance with the world's ecology, that we have a responsibility to use the earth's limited resources conscientiously.

9. I believe that we are responsible for ourselves and for each other.

10. I believe that it is our responsibility to be aware of others, to be mindful of others, to respect each other.

11. I value learning.

12. I believe that we should do the right thing as often as possible, and that we need to expect this of others around us. I believe that we should act ethically.

13. I believe that we need to respect and tolerate and embrace differences.

14. I believe that it is everyone's responsibility to nurture and protect our children.

15. I believe that we each have the right to determine our lives.

16. I believe that we each need to work to resolves conflicts and challenges.