Today we continue with the piece quoted by Merton in yesterday's devotion.
...we make the situation (minimizing my own sins and compensating for doing so by exaggerating the faults in others) much worse by artificially intensifying our sense of evil, and by increasing our propensity to feel guilt even for things which are not in themselves wrong. In all these ways we build up such an obsession with evil, both in ourselves and in others, that we waste all our mental energy trying to account for this evil, to punish it, to exorcise it, or to get rid of it in any way we can. We drive ourselves mad with our preoccupation and in the end there is no outlet left but violence. We have to destroy something or someone. By that time we have created for ourselves a suitable enemy, a scapegoat in whom we have invested all the evil in the world. S/he is the cause of every wrong. S/he is the fomentor or all conflict. If s/he can only be destroyed, conflict will cease, evil will be done with, there will be no more war.
Yesterday I asked us to read this with a look at ourselves and how we are pulled into the power of evil within ourselves that is projected onto others. Something we must always consider before we look out at others. Today, we must also consider the fact that just as we will act as we do - so will others. Even the brightest and best of humanity are able to, and indeed do, perpetrate horrible acts of evil upon others because of the belief that "those" people are the cause of what is wrong and evil and dangerous to the rest of us. Our history is littered with such acts both grand and small. Glance around the globe and without knowing much of specific arenas of danger and war we can see an intolerance of others. Not just that. It is more a hatred of others that covers over this fear we have of the other. As we claim to be bold and brave, it is this fear of others (and the fear of what we know is possible because we are a part of what can become evil) that triggers our intense need to devour and destroy the other. Think of it...there are the conservatives...the liberals...the people of that skin color...the people of that ethnic group...the gay and lesbians...the Mexican people spilling over the border...the people of Islam...and on and on and on. On all sides, hatred and fear is brewing so consistently that we miss the opportunity to speak and act within the bounds of peace and reconciliation. One side will not take the time to hear the other side because fear is so deep we do not risk the adventure of peace making - we must hang onto what we think is our own "good" side that must - at any cost - be planted as the good for all. This whole process smells of war in all the ways it is able to break out among us.
Connection: Take the time to look at our world and the issues of the day. What is it that is feared in the contexts at which you look? A simple exercise and yet it may be profoundly important for the welfare of each of our lives.
Come Lord, come and bring your peace among us. Just as your beloved, Jesus, walked in a way contrary to the ways of fear and war, invite us and encourage us to walk in this way that is the way of your gracious Reign. Amen.
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