Sunday, October 07, 2007

why i love public radio

I just heard the most amazing nun on the radio. Her name is Sister Joan Chittister, and well, if you have the time, please check it out here.

Which brings me to another point. People say there are two sides to everything. First of all, that is a simplistic and inaccurate statement. There might be two sides. But more likely, there might be 15 sides for all we know. Many questions, the important questions especially, are quite often beyond the description of words, much less the answers. Secondly, as we progress as a species, some things become one-sided. (Slavery is evil and must be stopped, for example) There appears to be emerging a global consensus in the area of, for lack of a better term, progressive thought. I believe this convergence, which originates from the most diverse and varied points/individuals, (its decidedly not coming from the establishment) to be indicative of greater truth. That is to say, in a nutshell, we're right.

Those of us who believe in one love, that we should strive for equality and justice for All, those of us who deplore the raping, pillaging and fouling of our Earth, those of us who struggle to find hope in a society dominated by a massive concentration of wealth and destructive power the likes of which the world has never seen, those of us who are less concerned with someone's religion and sexuality as we are with the tangible results of our lives (are you bringing forth more love or less, more compassion or less?), those of us who hold sacred exisiting human life in addition to the embryonic, even as we work to minimize the need for the practice of ending embryonic life, those of us who consider the coming generation when analyzing our actions, We are on the right path.

We should question and vet, we should play devil's advocate, and we should always consider all viewpoints, but there comes a point when, as in science, truth emerges and naysayers expose themselves as less than credible. To continue to insist the earth is flat despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary doesn't serve any positive purpose in the long run. Ask yourself, is holding this belief contributing to a better world or does it feed my pocketbook/ego? Does it lead to equality and justice for All? or does it maintain the status quo?

Honest disagreement is a part of the process, there are countless questions left to be debated and investigated, but I think there are a great number of critically important issues where a broad, all-inclusive consensus exists despite every effort by the powers that be to confuse and conquer.

Am I trying to wage class war? I'm not waging anything, the ruling class has left a trail of blood from here back to the dawn of history. I'm fighting for survival.

1 comment:

crallspace said...

You're such a Unitarian Universalist. That's no insult.

I didn't listen closely to Sister Joan.