What answers did you get to the question you asked at the workshop, and what further questions have now arisen for you?

Background

Sixteen of us met for two hours on Sunday morning, 12th July - after the conference had finished - to explore, experientially, what was meant by intellectual foundation as it had been presented in the keynote address. We began with Inquiry, by answering the question: "what do I want out of this session?"

Our replies are summarised below:

• to solidify the basics of Lonergan's structure of intentionality
• to connect this to the virtues and decision-making
• to appreciate how Lonergan's language can inform business strategy
• to direct graduate students more intelligently
• to learn how Lonergan connects to other learning models, such as Kolb
• to explore the structure
• to learn anything that will help us teach sustainability
• to gather information and assess its suitability for my work
• to get sparks
• about leadership and learning - action inquiry, and the place of the irrational
• new emphasis on the heart: how to look at navigating heart wisdom
• how Lonergan's theories on economics and circulation analysis might apply to business, particularly in poor areas

We decided to begin our discussion on the the meaning of the heart. A deep reflection followed: belief, or what we hoped to be true; total openess and trust; on distinctions between head, heart and gut; how faith illuminates who we are and how we view God; and how faith impacts our character; and how God speaks to the heart.

The moments of heart are not always clear - as a voice not always listened to.

Two reported of a deep encounter they had had the day previously. Were the goose-bumps they both experienced at the time a bodily expression of shared Insight? At least for one of them, his experience led him to change his plans and move in a new direction - from Insight to Action!

Small insights come continuously in dialogue and where there is interest and some form of inquiry. They can be a corrective to emotional experience.

And what of contesting ideas - wherein lies Truth? What is a Position? And where do dialectics lie, the art of argument towards a true position; and rhetoric, the art of persuading others to adopt it?

What is Experience? Can we change it, and if so, how? We noticed how our Senses feed our experience, and that by controlling our senses, we can shift our experience. But what do we have in Conscious Experience?

What place is there for silence? Did the Lord speak out of silence? Does silence lie at our centre? Is this a comfortable place to be?

If Inquiry gets things going, how do teachers facilitate it? What place is there for a pedagogy which empowers students from the outset to inquire? Are we, as teachers, modelling this, and are we setting the right conditions for genuinely deep and creative inquiry to be cultivated and to occur within our students?