In small pockets of humanity, sometimes we take very small steps forward - and sometimes these pockets gradually pull the rest of us up from what we have known for thousands of years. Other small pockets can have the opposite effect - these are dictators, and despots, and people who place power and profit over grace and compassion. America was a first among nations, but it was inspired by people from thousands of years ago who gave their lives for this ideal - that among the many, a better way can be achieved. Democracy is not about the majority making the rules; it is about the framework of the nation itself protecting the weak who are unable to protect themselves. It is about the ideals of freedom, and equality - that all men are created equally and should not be judged for any reason but their actions. Sometimes we have failed, or taken to long to do the right thing - sometimes we have been hypocrites. Admitting that does not make us weaker, or less of a people and a nation. It makes us stronger, for only by admitting our mistakes can we look into the future with a clearer eye for what needs to be done. Today it seems as though we have been handed our good fortune, but our good fortune is a thin skin stretched taut across the rest of the world. If we do not care for it, and cherish it then it will rip, and the progress made by those who have gone before us, soldiers and pacifists who have shared their blood in the same cause will be for naught. Some things are broken in this world, and some things are better than ever. We must look upon ourselves first, and try to fix that which is not right and true. I wish I knew the way to do that - as good citizens we must be prepared, for our political structure has been degraded over the past decades to something which no longer serves these higher goals. In fact, I would go so far as to say that since our inception as a nation, our progress has been made not by our political leaders, but despite them. The exceptions to this are rare, and they are exceptions which prove my point - they are exceptions which have been brought to power by the sheer will of the people to live up to our ideals with our very lives. We cannot do any less, as the generation which is ushering in this new century. Will we progress, or will we step backwards? That is the question which lies before all of us - but if we are guided by mercy, and compassion and love then we need not fear our mistakes. We need only learn from them. The Tao te Ching was written many hundreds of years ago, and is not a religious work in the usual sense - it deals with philosophy, and touches on many religious aspects of our lives, but it threatens or contradicts no religion - it merely offers wisdom as provided by the author of the work, Lao Tzu. He wrote these words over 2500 years ago, and they have an uncanny ring of truth today. This is verse 30, as translated by Ralph Alan Dale: Those on the path of the Great Integrity never use military force to conquer others. Every aggressive act harvests its own counter-terrorism. Wherever the military marches, the killing fields lay waste to the land, yielding years of famine and misery. When attacked, those on the path of the Great Integrity defend themselves benevolently, never revenging. Achieve success without arrogance, without seeking glory, and without violating others. Aggression leaches our strength and humanity, subverting the Great Integrity, and inviting disaster. These words are hard to listen to in modern times - but it strikes me that someone who wrote them so long ago could make such comments which affect us so deeply in todays climate. The world can be a hard place - but as the most powerful nation, and one to which human dignity and rights is so important a concept, we should heed with special attention what these words say. |
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| What would you do? Think about how much you would sacrifice for your children |
| Of God and Science The Natural Tension between the two, and what we can learn from it. |
| from the present |