My Dear Companions on the Journey…
Today’s “Are We Done Yet?” headline: U.S. SAYS SYRIAN GOVERNMENT MAY HAVE USED CHEMICAL WEAPONS AGAINST ITS CITIZENS.
That headline follows by days the news of the Boston bombing, and the weeks of endless threats by North Korea of atomic warfare. Every morning humanity awakens to another in an endless succession of stories of violence or threats of violence by one group of human beings upon another.
As this continues, a central question looms larger and larger every day: How much longer must this go on before our species realizes that a fundamental shift in its ideas about itself is the only thing that will stop this endless slide toward our own self-destruction?
A report from National Public Radio says that “multiple reports in recent days have cited the possible use of chemical weapons around the Syrian cities of Damascus and Aleppo last month and an earlier one in Homs. Victims reportedly suffered burns, blisters, breathing problems, severe irritation to the eyes and even blindness.”
The NPR report was careful in noting that such symptoms may also be caused by conventional weapons of war. White phosphorus, for instance, is “a component in some artillery shells that is not a chemical weapon. It produces large clouds of smoke and can cause the types of injuries that have been reported,” the NPR report said.
Nevertheless, the assessment of other nations, not just the U.S. (among them, France, Great Britain, and Israel) is that some from of chemical weapon has likely been employed against the Syrian rebels by the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
What will be the “Are We Done Yet?” headline tomorrow?
NEWS ANALYSIS – Part One
Are we done yet? Have we had enough yet? Are we ready now, at last, to do something about humanity’s inhumanity? What will it take for the human race to stand up en masse and say, “No more. We are done with this.”
Can we bring about the Miracle of the Ages? Is our species capable of creating a new world headline?
HUMANITY RENOUNCES SEPARATION
Human beings can split the atom, create a cure for disease, send a man to the moon and crack the genetic code of life itself. Yet, sadly, many people, perhaps the largest number, cannot do the simplest thing.
Get along.
Why is this, do you imagine? Do you think it may have anything to do with the fact that we do not see ourselves as Family, but, rather, insist on telling ourselves a Story of Separation? Right now we are embracing a Separation Theology on this planet. Separation Theology is a way of looking at God that insists that we are “over here” and God is “over there.”
The problem with a Separation Theology is that it produces a Separation Cosmology. That is, a way of looking at all of life that says that everything is separate from everything else. And a Separation Cosmology produces a Separation Psychology. That is, a psychological viewpoint that says that I am over here and you are over there. And a Separation Psychology produces a Separation Sociology. That is, a way of socializing with each other that encourages the entire human society to act as separate entities serving their own separate interests. And a Separation Sociology produces a Separation Pathology. That is, pathological behaviors of self-destruction, engaged in individually and collectively, and producing suffering, conflict, violence, and death by our own hands—as evidenced everywhere on our planet throughout human history.
We can change all that. But the important element there is the word “we.” It will take many of us. Millions of us. But “we” can do it.
(In Part II of this analysis: No Fair. “The world is a better place than it has ever been.” Is this true?)
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EDITOR’S NOTE: You may find it valuable and interesting to read two other articles on this Home Page. (1) OF ADDITIONAL INTEREST: One Possible Response to Violence in Our World; and (2) the article at the bottom on the right-hand column headlined And Finally…
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