TO HATE OR NOT TO HATE . . .

       If within the past two or three days you have had access to television, the internet, or any other form of electronic communication, you have seen the pictures.

    Charlottesville, Virginia, home of Thomas Jefferson's University and a symbol of tolerance became the site of an outpouring of hatred reminiscent of intolerance visited upon German cities prior to World War Two.  Article One of America's Constitutional Bill of Rights spells out without equivocation the  "right of the people peaceably to assemble  . . ."  When many of the 'protesters' came armed with high-powered weaponry, 'peaceably' did not rank high in their intentions.  

    It would be easy to fall into a kind of cynicism suggested by the late Eric Hoffer in The True Believer: "hatred is the most accessible and comprehensive of all unifying agents."
After all, the long-ago radio  drama, The Shadow, always answered  the question, "Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?" with "The Shadow knows."  Evil (or to render its theological name, Sin) has been around for a long time and likely will remain.

     Is there an antidote or an alternative?  There are those among us who believe otherwise.  

    In the past two days there have been several  Facebook posts of Nelson Mandela's saying that "no one is born hating another person because of the color of  his skin or his background or his religion . . . People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love . . . For love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite."  Somewhat like the song in the  1958 musical South  Pacific ..."You've got to be carefully taught . . ."

    There is that often overused, misused and misunderstood word ---LOVE.  It is not always synonymous with LIKE. Here I am not relying on some kind of soppy, mushy or even affectionate emotion.  Rather, how about words like compassionate, kindness, shared humanity ?  

     Whether one is an adherent, a believer, a practitioner or not, the Judeo-Christian scriptures offer alternatives to the  violence: "He has told you, O mortal, what is good, and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God." (Micah 6:8)
And, perhaps the best known single verse in the Christian Testament: "For God loved the world so much . . ."  If one is to claim "Christian" as an identifier, then loving that which God loves becomes the bedrock.  

     I know; some would dismissively call these platitudes.  Try it. I suggest that it takes courage ---variously defined as 'the quality of mind or spirit that enables a person to face difficulty, danger, pain ...    with out fear' and 'mental or moral strength to venture, persevere , and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty.' With that can come risks and consequences . . . personal, political, relational just to name the more obvious.   The Englishman, Edmund Burke, long ago noted that "the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."

    Hate groups have no legitimate place within the fabric of civilized society !

     Satchel