President Barack Obama's inaugural speech calls for a "Sense of Responsibility"

Here is what A BALANCING ACT calls for actors' sense of responsibility: (page 228)

A Responsibility To The World
© Emmanuelle Chaulet 2008

"From ancient times on, actors have been the ones to give humanity the ability to see, feel, and realize their human condition.
It is now a responsibility for actors to go back to the spiritual aspect of their work. I am talking about the development of a mindset, which will share in the engagement of taking the entire human race toward evolution.

Actors are conduits, channels of energies that go beyond their immediate understanding. They are pure servants to the powerful forces of literature, imagination, and creation. They are like the priests and priestesses of the ancient temples serving the altars of spiritual life for mankind. It is so important that they reconnect with this responsibility right now, because they do not realize how huge their impact on society is. Almost every soul on the planet watches television nowadays, and an enormous percentage of what people watch consists of movies. Movies have become the new religion. People desert churches on Sundays, but faithfully turn on the tube every night to see what’s on and to try to forget the misery of their little lives in front of stories that either show them a better one, or exorcise their deepest fears.

Actors are no longer — and they have never been — insignificant artists that just entertain. They are showing to the entire world ideas, examples, and thought patterns that will fashion the future of humanity. Better than priests, politicians or philosophers, they carry the huge weight of shaping a new society, the one that will make or break world peace. It is crucial that they realize the importance of their role. Windows on humanity and teachers, actors show what the depth of a human soul can hold, and teach what one should or should not do, what kind of consequences decisions can lead to. They enable humans to visualize themselves in a mirror. They permit regular folks to see what is outmoded in their lives. They make people think about, reflect on, and question their condi- tions. They show new and better ways to do things. They denounce
behaviors that are destructive and negative by performing plays on human rights and violence. They lead the way to behaviors that create a better world, with stories showing exemplary courage or compassion. They can teach us about our environment, our history, our connection to the earth and the cosmos. They can lead us to more tolerance and understanding of our differences by showing us other cultures, other religions, other races. They can warn us of dangers that threaten the rest of humanity. They also enact for the rest of us a general catharsis of our deepest wounds, fears, desires and dark sides. Through their intense performances we transcend what we dare not do, or wish we should have done, in real life.

Actors are like spirit guides as they can, through a film or a play, teach us what we have to learn to move ahead in our evolution. Yet, in order to achieve all of this, they must choose the correct
scripts, the ones that will hold insight and positively influence the audience. "

You can read the whole article in A BALANCING ACT.