division

All religions, in their pure form, will tell you God is Love. And power, fear, division, judgment, oppression, hatred and self-righteousness are the opposite of Love. So going to war, for example, in the name of religion, is a complete contradiction. No pure religious leader would ever support this.

Washington DC is happiest when in indignation overdrive.

Law, rather than harnessing the passions, is increasingly pressed into their service.

Adams met with a convention on keeping the Sabbath and found the atmosphere surprisingly similar to that in Congress. Legalistic disputes so abounded that he found it difficult to keep order.

Divisions in mankind are unnatural. They are man made.

Divide the constant tide and random noisiness of energetic flow, with conscious recurring moments of empty mind, solitude, gratitude and deep...slow...breathing. Of this, the natural law of self-preservation demands.

Focusing on effective leadership without focusing on a willingness to follow is like studying clapping by studying only the left hand.

Until all processes are progressed, the world will not process meaningful, measurable progress.Progress the process, in order to process, progress. This shall be the responsibility of those who are for the light of universal innovation, as opposed to the benefactors of sectarian division.

Division and differentiation are the processes by which things are created. Since things are emerging and dissolving all the time, you cannot specify the point when this division will stop.

Christians could agree or argue about God as much as we wanted, but it was all essentially chatter. What bound that driver and me together was the obvious thing, so plain and dumb between us we could almost ignore it: the rough wooden pallet of onions that organized our days. Feed the hungry, heal the sick, visit prisoners. We fed people.

We divided ourselves among caste, creed, culture and countries but what is undivided remains most valuable: a mere smile and the love.

Human reason reduced to its own resources is perfectly worthless, not only for creating but also for preserving any political or religious association, because it only produces disputes, and, to conduct himself well, man needs not problems but beliefs. His cradle should be surrounded by dogmas, and when his reason is awakened, it should find all his opinions ready-made, at least all those relating to his conduct. Nothing is so important to him as prejudices, Let us not take this word in a bad sense. It does not necessarily mean false ideas, but only, in the strict sense of the word, opinions adopted before any examination. Now these sorts of opinions are man__ greatest need, the true elements of his happiness, and the Palladium of empires. Without them, there can be neither worship, nor morality, nor government. There must be a state religion just as there is a state policy; or, rather, religious and political dogmas must be merged and mingled together to form a complete common or national reason strong enough to repress the aberrations of individual reason, which of its nature is the mortal enemy of any association whatever because it produces only divergent opinions. All known nations have been happy and powerful to the extent that they have more faithfully obeyed this national reason, which is nothing other than the annihilation of individual dogmas and the absolute and general reign of national dogmas, that is to say, of useful prejudices. Let each man call upon his individual reason in the matter of religion, and immediately you will see the birth of an anarchy of belief or the annihilation of religious sovereignty. Likewise, if each man makes himself judge of the principles of government, you will at once see the birth of civil anarchy or the annihilation of political sovereignty. Government is a true religion: it has its dogmas, its mysteries, and its ministers. To annihilate it or submit it to the discussion of each individual is the same thing; it lives only through national reason, that is to say through political faith, which is a creed. Man__ first need is that his nascent reason be curbed under this double yoke, that it be abased and lose itself in the national reason, so that it changes its individual existence into another common existence, just as a river that flows into the ocean always continues to exist in the mass of water, but without a name and without a distinct reality.

Now how does all this relate to Islamic jihad? Islam sees violence as a means of propagating the Muslim faith. Islam divides the world into two camps: the dar al-Islam (House of Submission) and the dar al-harb (House of War). The former are those lands which have been brought into submission to Islam; the latter are those nations which have not yet been brought into submission. This is how Islam actually views the world!By contrast, the conquest of Canaan represented God__ just judgement upon those peoples. The purpose was not at all to get them to convert to Judaism! War was not being used as an instrument of propagating the Jewish faith. Moreover, the slaughter of the Canaanites represented an unusual historical circumstance, not a regular means of behavior.The problem with Islam, then, is not that it has got the wrong moral theory; it__ that it has got the wrong God. If the Muslim thinks that our moral duties are constituted by God__ commands, then I agree with him. But Muslims and Christians differ radically over God__ nature. Muslims believe that God loves only Muslims. Allah has no love for unbelievers and sinners. Therefore, they can be killed indiscriminately. Moreover, in Islam God__ omnipotence trumps everything, even His own nature. He is therefore utterly arbitrary in His dealing with mankind.

Author says the ineffectual U.S. Navy of two centuries ago lost two thirds as many men to duelist bullets as to sea hazards.

The victors always think they are righteous. But then, they always seem to start a mighty unrighteous squabbling over the spoils.

They want us to be afraid. They want us to be afraid of leaving our homes. They want us to barricade our doors and hide our children. Their aim is to make us fear life itself! They want us to hate. They want us to hate 'the other'. They want us to practice aggression and perfect antagonism. Their aim is to divide us all! They want us to be inhuman. They want us to throw out our kindness. They want us to bury our love and burn our hope. Their aim is to take all our light! They think their bricked walls will separate us. They think their damned bombs will defeat us. They are so ignorant they don__ understand that my soul and your soul are old friends. They are so ignorant they don__ understand that when they cut you I bleed. They are so ignorant they don__ understand that we will never be afraid, we will never hate and we will never be silent for life is ours!

Humanizing war?! You may as well talk of humanizing Hell. Sir John Fisher

Religion divides us, while it is our human characteristics that bind us to each other.