The New Beauty: Sustainability: "'The default setting of our civilization needs to be reset to ensure that we build a sustainable world that is also spiritually sustaining. ..."
Commenting on David Orr, Marissa wrote: "I have never thought about sustainability this way: ensuring beauty for the future. Brilliant!"
Thanks Marissa. Now I need to scroll down to find the post I wrote about Terry Tempest Williams and her assertion that beauty is not optional. This seems especially significant in view of those three approaches to reading buildings, the third of which asks about its beauty.
Let's keep noticing the attention and value authors and activists give to beauty. Jonathan Edwards cared for it, but I wonder how often American Christians of various sorts have given any sustained, thoughtful consideration to beauty. And what about politicians: are they willing to fund projects that include a line-item for beauty? Yes, there are some provisions for "public art." Nonetheless, I suspect that beauty is often relegated to the category of values that are expendable. We Americans most often value function over form.
Is anyone willing to assert freedom from ugliness as important for the common good? Was something like that behind Jefferson's careful design for UVA?
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