All You Need is Love...

Love without courage and wisdom is sentimentality, as with the ordinary church member.
Courage without love and wisdom is foolhardiness, as with the ordinary soldier.
Wisdom without love and courage is cowardice, as with the ordinary intellectual.
But the one who has love, courage, and wisdom moves the world. -Ammon Hennacy

The world is one messed up place. It's really hard to think about it all for a long period of time without eventually wanting to just put those thoughts away and find something happier to let your mind dwell upon.

There are wars today in the name of peace and justice. There are churches fighting against the rights of gays and lesbians in the name of truth. There are atheists today fighting against religion in the pursuit of reason. There are citizens today "tolerating" people out of "love."

And there's something really bothersome about it all. Something that makes me want to break. Because, yes, I think it's important to have peace, to have justice, to have truth, to have reason, to have love. I just don't think humanity has quite gotten their fingers around how to get these things all together, or maybe, what all of them really mean.

We value supporting our troops, going to war to bring peace and freedom. Can I ask whether this is simply one-sided? What about the people we are fighting against? Are they also included in this equation which equals out to peace and freedom? If we support the value of love, I don't think killing our neighbour quite follows this trend. If we follow the value of courage, then I still don't think killing our neighbour follows this trend. For if you were truly courageous, you would chance to sacrifice yourself to try and help someone by not killing them. That would be the scary part-facing death to help someone else-and it requires true courage. If we support the value of peace, then no, war is not the method. Arguments require two people, but they can be avoided by the gentle kindness of one. Peace is finding a resolution that puts another above yourself. is it possible that instead of going to war, that we could send doctors? that we could send teachers? that we could send missionaries? For getting rid of hate requires a change of heart. Are we willing to put some cream on the callouses of hate that have built up on the hearts of our enemies, or are we indifferent? Hm.

Thoreau said "the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." There's something about our way of living that lacks something... concrete. As if we know the principles, the values, the arches which govern our actions, but we don't know how to fit them all together. Or maybe we don't want to. Because we know that if we were to ever determine the true arch that governs our actions, it would require something of us that we don't want to have to be. And so we are forever in a state of desperation, striving for love, courage, wisdom, but never quite living them out to the point of their true fullness.

But then again, maybe we can find them in God. ;)