Introduction

In this episode, we're joined by Casper ter Kuile. He's the author of "The Power of Ritual," a Harvard Divinity School fellow, host of the award-winning podcast "Harry Potter and the Sacred Text," and a co-founder of Sacred Design Lab. In this video we connect past (more traditional) communities to modern day communities and discuss how they are intertwined.  This discussion focuses on: 1) Where community comes from. 2) How ancient community practices show up unwittingly in today’s world. 3) Echoes of old practices finding new form in today’s world. 4) How can old traditions be valuable in today’s world and how can we learn from them? We also take a deep dive into the why and how religion/religious institutions have evolved over the years.  Additionally, we discuss religious rituals and how they can be seen everywhere from our fitness communities to our workplaces.  In this discussion we focus on: 1) What has been attributed to the decline of religion over the past 50 years. 2) Religion as an institution vs. religion as a belief and value system. 3) How people satisfy their spiritual desires in today's world. 4) Where are people finding things that have been unbundled from religion. What platform/technology will allow customers to connect better with themselves, others, nature, and a sense of a higher existence (transcendence) in a coherent way. Finally, we discuss what all community builders can learn from religious communities, and how to identify rituals that bring deeper purpose and soul into your community spaces.  This includes: 1) How the workplace provides for a more meaningful community. 2) What does a community need to help people make meaning and build authentic relationships. 3) Where do people go/who do people trust to “shape” them. 4) Rituals that take place in our lives and in community spaces. Links and learnings: — https://www.caspertk.com/ — https://sacred.design/ — https://twitter.com/caspertk — https://cmxhub.com/academy/the-community-mba/