As a Nobel Peace laureate, I, like most people, agonize over the use of force. But when it comes to rescuing an innocent people from tyranny or genocide, I've never questioned the justification for resorting to force. That's why I supported Vietnam's...
It cannot be denied that as institutions, churches do good work. They operate schools and hospitals. Their charity outreaches, which take care of the homeless, sick, and hungry, have real impacts on communities. And while there are certainly hellfire...
Walk into any church, and you will see people swimming in a sea of emotions (everything from shame and guilt to love and ecstasy). That may be the reason some people think that the more emotional they are, the more spiritual they are. But, as we will...
For example, the call for equal rights has perverted into “let’s all be the same.” Male and female biological differences are discounted, because “male” and “female” are considered “outdated social constructs,” and while that is par...
Growth seems to evolve from a narrow-minded, constricted worldview (selfish) to an ever-more-encompassing worldview (multiperspective caring). To put it simply, the more self-centered you are, the lower you tend to land on these scales, while the mor...
For more than twenty years, I have been seeking a way to be both rational and spiritual. I have been looking for a ray of hope in an otherwise-compartmentalized world in which people segregate religious aspirations and rationality in the hope of not ...
We all reek of weariness. A room full of the black-soul phenomenon. All of a sudden I don’t feel so alone in the recognition of my own mixed feelings mirrored in those faces. In those faces, I see that the seemingly repugnant behavior wasn’t so a...
The Procrustean bed. . .suggests itself with dispiriting aptness as a metaphor for the Culture Wars, right down to the blandishments with which Procrustes must have lured his guests over the threshold. (I picture him as a handsome fellow with a large...
Kilmartin wrote a highly amusing and illuminating account of his experience as a Proust revisionist, which appeared in the first issue of Ben Sonnenberg's quarterly in the autumn of 1981. The essay opened with a kind of encouragement: 'There used to ...
Nothing feeds forgetfulness better than war, Daniel. We all keep quiet and they try to convince us that what we've seen, what we've done, what we've learned about ourselves and about others, is an illusion, a passing nightmare. Wars have no memory, a...
Once upon a time there were two countries, at war with each other. In order to make peace after many years of conflict, they decided to build a bridge across the ocean. But because they never learned each other’s language properly, they could never...
In decades from now, I’m sure they’ll say we Joes were all noble, every one of us grimy but patriotic cherubs. Because we won a war. Back home they already do think it, thanks to the publicity teams, the ads, correspondents, censors. I’m not bu...
14 July 1942—Jerusalem - ...A magnificent parcel, covered in tape and seals, arrived for me from India. Inside were two pairs of old fashioned corsets with bones and laces. They were sent by HRH The Duke of Gloucester. Nick and I had an argument as...
This is the other secret that real artists know and wannabe writers don’t. When we sit down each day and do our work, power concentrates around us. The Muse takes note of our dedication. She approves. We have earned favor in her sight. When we sit ...
When I was a teenager I took freedom for granted until I got through the army and saw what the Nazis had done in Germany. Then I realized that freedom isn't automatic; it has a price. World War II was a justified and necessary war. Last year I met fi...
Of course, we in the West like to pat ourselves on the back and say we're more tolerant, and we are--but tolerance is not the same thing as acceptance. It just means, "We think you're crazy and going to hell, but we won't kill you for it--we'll you. ...
Isn't it time we asked ourselves, are we willing to accept any behavior codified within religious or cultural practice? Is there no line to be drawn? If honor killings are okay, then why not virgin sacrifices or cannibalism or sex with children outsi...
[F]reedom isn't free. It shouldn't be a bragging point that "Oh, I don't get involved in politics," as if that makes you somehow cleaner. No, that makes you derelict of duty in a republic. Liars and panderers in government would have a much harder ti...
Homeward bound I suddenly noticed before me my own shadow as I had seen the shadow of the other war behind the actual one. During all this time it has never budged from me, that irremovable shadow, it hovers over every thought of mine by day and by n...
Look now,' Vesna's mother continued, 'what do you know, a civil war might break out any minute: Serbs would fight with Croats, Czechs would fight with Slovaks, Hungarians would fight with Jews. how can you be sure of anything?' 'But, Mother, if this ...
Humanity is ONE. The moment you separate yourself from it, you are at odds with the propagation of world unity and peace. The moment you become a racist, anti-Muslim and other negative and divisive stance, you are a breaker, NOT A HEALER. IF you sele...
