Mapping infrastructures of Mystery: scaffolding the wonder of existence

What would a society look like where we do create space and opportunity for encounters with the depth and mystery of life – whatever that may mean for different people? How can we make sure that we support the enormous diversity of relationships that people have to this mystery and depth? What infrastructures are needed – in terms of space, money, institutional setups, skills and expertise, and more? 

These are questions we have been investigating as the Transforming Cities community (part of Pathways to Sustainability), under the concept of ‘infrastructures of mystery’. Our sessions so far seem to be touching on something fundamental. The research has been led by Joost Vervoort, who has recently also written an article about the need for engagement with mystery in the Dutch newspaper NRC.

In times of ecological destruction and the erasure of democracies, finding ways to create wellsprings of depth and mystery would likely benefit people and communities in many ways – becoming refuges for mental health, social connection, creativity and new perspectives, and more.

We are organizing two online dialogues where we will be presenting research results that attempt to map infrastructures of mystery. We want to involve you in this mapping effort. 

We will be discussing radical projects and examples that act as ‘seeds’ of engagement with mystery, and from there, we will discuss different ways to identify infrastructures of mystery. We want to hear about your examples and your ideas about the best ways to frame this topic. 

We will organize two sessions on June 18th: One at 16.00 CEST and one at 20.00 CEST – to accommodate for different time zones. Both sessions will take 1 hours and 45 minutes.

Sign up here for the 16.00 session and here for the 20.00 session!