CREATIVE CHAOS AND STRANGE ATTRACTOR. EXPLAINING THE EMERGENCE OF NOVELTIES UNDER TOTALITY AND FINDING NEW IMPULSES FOR SPIRITUALITY IN TODAY’S CZECH
CREATIVE CHAOS AND STRANGE ATTRACTOR. EXPLAINING THE EMERGENCE OF NOVELTIES UNDER TOTALITY AND FINDING NEW IMPULSES FOR SPIRITUALITY IN TODAY’S CZECH

Summary/Abstract: Under the repressive conditions of totality (communism) in Czechoslovakia between 1948–1989, there evolved in the underground some new approaches to teaching and serving the spiritual needs of the people. An interdisciplinary theological faculty, founded by Felix M. Davídek, emphasized how knowledge from science and religion/spirituality could have a cooperative effect. To understand how such innovative practices and insights could emerge under a repressive regime (non-equilibrium conditions), one might today turn to chaos theory. The activity of an apparent helping factor, “strange attractor”, may assist in the transition to a more complex, information-enriched state. In today’s Czech Republic, the question is how to build on innovations from the past, and to inform and inspire the young generation on their own quests for spirituality.

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