The recent shooting at the Sikh temple in Wisconsin is another reminder that something needs to change in the fundamental thinking of our society to prevent atrocities, such as this, from happening over and over again.
With the Colorado shooting in an Aurora movie theater a few weeks ago and college campus shootings before that, it seems that these unprovoked outbreaks of violence against innocent citizens by armed gunmen with no warning is happening with increasing number. What can we do?
One is to properly identify the criminal.
With each case, there is a gunman involved who is identified as the criminal, and he is tried accordingly. But the real criminal is the evil that motivated the gunman in the first place.
It’s interesting to note that Wade Michael Page, the shooter in Wisconsin, is associated with the white supremacist movement, and was heavily involved in past years with producing band music that was filled with hate content. Any metaphysician quickly can see that it’s impossible to act on hatred toward one’s fellowman if one is not already harboring that hatred in thought. Thoughts lead to actions. To eliminate acts of hate, thoughts of hate need to be wiped out.
And this is where societal change and improvement can take place.
Hatred is a crime. It’s an evil that leads to harm, and it can lead to grave harm when allowed to grow unchecked. It needs to be treated as a crime.
There are certainly degrees of hatred, such as the somewhat innocent, “I hate to weed the garden,” and “I hate homework.” These protests of unhappiness are not going to bring society down.
It’s the malicious hatred toward person that needs to stop.
Smoking in public has been determined harmful to the public good, and steps have been taken to ban it. Why not resolve to ban hatred?
It’s impossible to love and hate at the same time. As we collectively raise children who truly love their neighbor, see the good in others, honor every man, woman and child as a loved and precious child of God regardless of race, religion, or color, hatred is going to disappear in our society and in our world. Love is going to take over, and mindless, irrational shooting sprees motivated by the unthinking impulse of hate will cease.
There is something we can do. And we must be up and doing it!
“Love must triumph over hate.” Mary Baker Eddy (SH43:32).
I’ve heard it said that “anything less than love, is hate” and I’m beginning to see it’s true.
You said, “To eliminate acts of hate, thoughts of hate need to be wiped out.”
Wipe out, get rid of, throw away, dismiss; decisive, intentional actions that do the job, and we can do it.
Now, I ask you, how do we eradicate hate? Not by a lot of nice words. Not by declaring God is love. We have done this, since MBE’s discovery of C/S. Now! We still have it, and it’s getting worse. We saw it in Hitler’s Germany, In Russia, in Iraq, etc. Wars, laws, rules, and still we have it. EDUCATION of what hate is, and what it does, and where it comes from. EDUCATION of what love is, what it does, and where it comes from. This has to done at the moment of birth not 10, 12 years later. Also, the weather acts as a barometer of how much hate and how little. All of this negative weather we’re having lately are definitely caused by the increase of hate in the world today. C/S really has the definite answer to stop this attitude of hate and to practice loving.
As always Evan you hone in on what we need to focus on, so grateful for your inspired wisdom…in reading Tobias’ comment I was reminded of the Pulizer Prize winning song from the musical South Pacific: You’ve Got to be Carefully Taught. We’re not born with hate, we are taught to hate. Which means we can unlearn it, and replace it with what we are taught about love……it’s never too late to learn love and to live it more vividly, it we accept that it’s too late, we believe in incurability, and gratefully, no ‘thought’ or ‘idea’ is incurable……..CS teaches us this poignant truth…….thank you for your love and stay safe…….Leah
Thanks Evan,
There was also a revealing interview with the activist/filmmaker Michael Moore right after Aurora. I was interested to hear, frustrated and angry as he was about guns, etc., he laid the blame squarely on fear. That people, those with guns and those without are being ruled in this day and age by fear. Which I thought was astute from a human, material standpoint. And, we know the solution is more of us seeing Love at the helm.
Sancy