More from the chapter "Union and Division" by Thomas Merton.
The person who lives in division is not a person but only an "individual."
I have what you have not. I am what you are not. I have taken what you have failed to take and I have seized what you could never get. Therefore you suffer and I am happy, you are despised and I am praised, you die and I live; you are nothing and I am something, and I am all the more something because you are nothing. And thus I spend my life admiring the distance between you and me; at time this even helps me to forget the other people who have what I have not and who have taken what I was too slow to take and who have seized what was beyond my reach, who are praised as I cannot be praised and who live on my death...
This may take a few days to unpack. Let me begin with that opening line. It does not take much to become an individual. The parting of my hair can do that. The way I walk can do that. The place I choose to live can do that. But this does not make a person. I am not just another body walking down the street. I am not simply different from you because of my look or certain designated aspects of what is the status of the day. I am completely fresh and new and beloved by the Creator of all things and that is without having to first make myself worthy in your presence or the presence of anyone else. In fact, as we each entertain the wonder of becoming our person...we become that person in the presence of others...not as separate...but as one whole creative and living power of life called humanity...the whole.
Connection: What can help close the gap in some of the divisions we have built into our lives?
Gracious Lord, there are so many ways we are invited to let down our hair and rest in the truthfulness of your love for us. When we rest there, we find life we may not have expected and it is quite beautiful and empowering. We give you thanks. Amen.
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