From a distance, we pray and hold the victims hand as they try to cope with their loss and pain. There in Boston, the gears of justice are in motion as countless work to find those responsible for the slaughter.
Because somewhere out there, someone is responsible. This was no accident. We wish it could be. But it's not. On the day of the Boston marathon, someone lost the battle between good and evil. And that someone was one of us.
The line that divides good from evil runs right through the heart and soul of every single one of us. We experience that every day. We fail every day. We also succeed. However, when one of us fails so brutally - when they sign over their day to evil - we're horrified, and rightly so.
We're horrified, but we shouldn't be shocked. Because every day we breath the same air that the terrorist is breathing right now. We live in the same society, an often self-centered society where others can be just numbers on the computer screen of my life. Numbers that I manipulate as I wish for my own happiness. Numbers that I can add, multiply, divide... or even delete.
Newtown and its murdered schoolchildren, Gosnell's clinic with its bloodstained tiles and bottled body parts, and now Boston, with its murdered and maimed. They're all the bitter fruits of a society in which we learn by osmosis that we are the center of the universe. Even some of our greatest values are too often coined in terms of my rights, instead of my responsibilities.
The perpetrators of the bombings need to be caught, tried and punished. But much more than that, our society needs to stop and think. It's not dead - there are still heroes, people who ran towards the blasts instead of away from them. But there are also the monsters.
Boston's monster is one of us. One of us went over to hatred. One of us set the bombs. And now it's up to all of us to set that right. Starting in our own hearts. Good and evil, love and hatred, care and indifference are waging a war for control of our country and world. But the outcome of that war won't be decided out in the open.
That battle will be won or lost in the recesses of your heart. Every day.
Because somewhere out there, someone is responsible. This was no accident. We wish it could be. But it's not. On the day of the Boston marathon, someone lost the battle between good and evil. And that someone was one of us.
The line that divides good from evil runs right through the heart and soul of every single one of us. We experience that every day. We fail every day. We also succeed. However, when one of us fails so brutally - when they sign over their day to evil - we're horrified, and rightly so.
We're horrified, but we shouldn't be shocked. Because every day we breath the same air that the terrorist is breathing right now. We live in the same society, an often self-centered society where others can be just numbers on the computer screen of my life. Numbers that I manipulate as I wish for my own happiness. Numbers that I can add, multiply, divide... or even delete.
Newtown and its murdered schoolchildren, Gosnell's clinic with its bloodstained tiles and bottled body parts, and now Boston, with its murdered and maimed. They're all the bitter fruits of a society in which we learn by osmosis that we are the center of the universe. Even some of our greatest values are too often coined in terms of my rights, instead of my responsibilities.
The perpetrators of the bombings need to be caught, tried and punished. But much more than that, our society needs to stop and think. It's not dead - there are still heroes, people who ran towards the blasts instead of away from them. But there are also the monsters.
Boston's monster is one of us. One of us went over to hatred. One of us set the bombs. And now it's up to all of us to set that right. Starting in our own hearts. Good and evil, love and hatred, care and indifference are waging a war for control of our country and world. But the outcome of that war won't be decided out in the open.
That battle will be won or lost in the recesses of your heart. Every day.
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