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monthly issues:
Our newsletter, Enlightenment, will be available on a monthly basis via our website. Each month look for the following icon within the newsletter to indicate opportunities to volunteer and get involved. If you're interested in supporting future publications, please contact the editor.
What's in the name Enlightenment? We chose the name Enlightenment for our parent newsletter for numerous reasons. On one hand it visually ties in with our name, Early Light, however the definition also embodies history, knowledge and freedom. The Age of Enlightenment or The Enlightenment is a term used to describe a phase in Western philosophy and cultural life centered upon the eighteenth century, in which reason was advocated as the primary source and legitimacy for authority. Developing in Germany, France, Britain, the Netherlands, and Italy, the movement spread through much of Europe, including Russia and Scandinavia. The signatories of the American Declaration of Independence, the United States Bill of Rights and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen were motivated by "Enlightenment" principles. This period is also known as the Age of Reason, although the English Bill of Rights predates the era by a century. The intellectual and philosophical developments of that age (and their impact in moral, social, and political reform) aspired towards greater rights and liberties for common people based on self-governance, natural rights, natural law, central emphasis on liberty, individual rights, reason, common sense, and the principles of deism. These principles were a revolutionary departure from theocracy, autocracy, oligarchy, aristocracy, and the divine right of kings. The Enlightenment marks a principled departure from the Middle Ages, State & Church mandated oppression, toward an era of rational human discourse, freedom of religion, liberty, scientific advancement, and modernity. Also defined as intellectual insight, provided with information, made aware, clarity of mind, and illuminated. |
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