While great European literary authors show a sense of moral engagement, he said, "even in brilliant American novels, they're only engaged in the micro-dynamic of American life".
"A politics emptied of substantive moral engagement makes for an impoverished civic life.
Some decry the loss of seriousness, depth, subtlety, intelligence and moral engagement that's resulted.
He urged historians to relax their impersonal stance for one of moral engagement.
But civil authorities are never exempt from moral engagement and criticism, either from the church or its members.
Not only does fatigue narrow our vision and reduce our effectiveness, Ms. Heffernan argues, but it can restrict our moral engagement.
He urges liberals to be more judgmental: "A politics emptied of substantive moral engagement makes for an impoverished civic life.... Fundamentalists rush in where liberals fear to tread".
And in an age that rarely bothers to distinguish shallow novelty from true moral engagement, that is an act of courage.
It's one of the greatest, most audacious, most original documentaries ever made, one that poses — and, what's more, responds to — questions of cinematic form and moral engagement that underlie the very genre, the very idea of nonfiction film.
Numerous commentators have criticized the state of the American college presidency as lacking the strong voice and passionate moral engagement that presidents like Derek Bok of Harvard and Clark Kerr of the University of California system used to manifest.
It was an early sign of his detachment from collective action, as well as the pragmatic caution which have stayed with him, in spite of his moral engagement and intellectual boldness.
