Margaret Somerville The Integrative Power of "Why"

We typically understand integrity as living an authentic life—a life where one’s actions are consistent with one’s beliefs. But that is not enough. Indeed, understanding integrity in this purely individualist way leads to the social vision of coherence proffered by liberal individualism. If our sense of disintegration feels elusive, the possibility of living a whole life seems even more so. It is our hope that this issue of Comment will draw your attention to the possibility that that alienation which gnaws at us might not be eternal; that, perhaps, he who “holds all things together” might have the last, and lasting word.