2 Timothy 3: 1-5 “This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.
Can we find peace in war?
A simple meme with a child in an Army hat on facebook draws out the roaring crowd; the words anything war can do, peace can do better. Yeah, memes feed my writing these days. The ones I agree with and ones I disagree with.
“Anything war can do, peace can do better.”
Full names hidden to protect the innocent.
Comment from James: “Si vis pacem, para bellum is a Latin adage translated as, "If you want peace, prepare for war". What this means is war is inevitable and peace will never last. So no matter how good peace sounds, sadly there will always be war.”
Comment from Hannu: “It's more like a question about constructive or destructive thinking. I guess war is a good business for some ...but how much good does it really do? Revenge leads to another revenge...it's endless...
Building bridges is better than building walls.
Utopia ?
So what is it worth to win a battle if the war still gets harder and harder? That's what is happening now...nobody wins...”
Glenda wrote: “If only that statement were true. Wonderful young men & women who have served in our military who have lost their arms & legs. Lost their lives. To protect Americans & their freedoms against those who kill Americans. This post is irresponsible.”
John wrote a well thought out comment: Whenever I see discussions on-line promoting peace in the world, the path to peace is nearly always expressed in ways that indicate that peace must begin with us, and then the world will of course, become peaceful overall. This “peacefulness” as a practice frequently is promoted as a process of Spiritual Passivity, like that observed by practicing Buddhists.
Some 5 or 6 years ago as a result of this topic continually coming up in a discussion group that I facilitate I wrote a (somewhat long) article named: “An Argument Against the Development of Passivity as a Spiritual Practice”, that some might want to check out.
About a third of the way down in the article I state:
“The fact that we must be aware of is that the overwhelming majority of our fellow inhabitants of this planet neither understand, nor are much interested in understanding, our interest in developing a sense of detachment. As a result, they can misinterpret one of the aspects that manifest in an individual as they develop a sense of Detachment through Denial”…
…“The appearance of “outward passivity” has become a prominent goal in many of the Westernized Yogic and New Age Philosophies. It has been promoted as a character trait to be prized and developed on its own, rather than recognized as an outer manifestation of an inner development.”
“The snag is that Passivity developed as a personality trait alone can actually draw conflict.”
Last night we watched a movie called The Giver. I’m not into sci-fi but this one had a Tomorrowland feel to it and since I liked that one so much, I gave The Giver a shot. It was not a bad premise. The world had been changed and taken over, minds were erased and there was no hate, war, jealousy, anger, you name the emotion. People-bots floated around in a pristine controlled-life living and raising only children who were worthy.
Also gone was love. The feeling of love. One person was to receive the memories taken and stored with the Giver and wouldn’t you know it, the chosen one was a rebel going to defy the leader of the new world.
By the end of the movie, I realized something and it might only make sense to me but with everything going on in the world today it struck me as ironic. Without love, you can’t feel hate and with hate gone, you can’t know love. We watched the movie World Trade Center the other night and I believe the end words were:
John McLoughlin: [Narrating] "9/11 showed us what human beings are capable of. The evil, yeah, sure. But it also brought out the goodness we forgot could exist. People taking care of each other for no other reason than it was the right thing to do. It's important for us to talk about that good, to remember. 'Cause I saw all of it that day."
That says it all. While the darkness tries to smother you, while hate tries to take over the world love and compassion will rear its head and you’ll feel what all the angst is for, for us to find LOVE!
Rev. 19:14 “These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them: for he is Lord of lords, and King of kings: and they that are with him are called, and chosen, and faithful.”
Tomorrowland
The Giver
World Trade Center
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