Today I was reading a book by a favorite author, Erwin McManus, called Soul Cravings. It's a kind of introspective read; a look at humanity, an attempt to ask and tell what our souls are always craving, and an explanation for some side effects of not having enough of what we need; it's about LOVE.
I came to this part of the book and thought it was very applicable to yesterday's events:
ENTRY #5 The Danger of Loving Nothing
Ironically, sometimes when we feel there is no place for us in the world, we choose to live a life of isolation and disconnectedness--sort of our way of sticking it to all of humanity before they can get to us.
You've asked yourself the question over and over again, If there anyone who really cares? And your conclusion is, No. So you decide to join them. You're not going to care either. You're not going to feel any more hurt.
Sometimes we take this so far that we decide the only way not to feel pain is to inflict it.
It shouldn't surprise us that Ted Kaczynski, better known as the Unabomber, had chosen a life os isolation and disconnectedness, rejecting a world that he concluded had rejected him. It wasn't enough to simply run from it; he had to find some way to destroy it. Even the designation given him is revealing--Unabomber.
Una--
Contact with the real world--it's not optional; it's essential. We are created for relationship. We are born for community. For us to be healthy, we must be a part of others. Independence is one thing' isolation is another. The more we live disconnected lives, the more we become indifferent to the well-being of others.onesingularsolitaryalone
Over the years we've come to expect urban violence. If we were honest with ourselves, we would have to acknowledge that many of us have become desensitized to crime and violence in our inner cities and especially among the urban poor, which is probably why what happened in the quiet community of Jefferson County, Colorado so affected the American psyche. Two teenage boys planned for over a year to ruthlessly massacre as many students and teachers at Columbine High School as possible. If I know nothing else about Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, I know that they had given up on love. they no longer considered themselves a part of the human community. They cared for no one and cared about no one, not even themselves. Where there is no love, there is no value for life. When hate consumes our hearts, all we can think of, all we desire, is to destroy.
When there is disengagement from human community, there is potential for inhumanity.
The human heart was not created to be a container for hate.
When we allow bitterness, jealousy, envy, racism, lust, greed, and arrogance to fuel our souls, we create an environment within us to be agents of violence.
We live in a time when the most terrifying bomb is not a nuclear one, but a human one.
This is where humanity has come. This is how far we've evolved. We strap bombs around our chests, lure innocents into our presence, and then consider ourselves heroes as we destroy everything around us. If this were not bad enough, for some it has become a proof of spirituality.
There are people walking around us waiting to EXPLODE!
How many of us are walking around with fuses already lit? With the danger of oversimplifying, you are a danger to the world when you love nothing, and you're even more dangerous when you love the wrong things. When there is a vacuum of love within your soul, hate, bitterness, envy, and racism rush to fill the empty space.
There is a dramatic difference between fanaticism and love. Fanaticism justifies and defines who you hate. Love embraces and leaves no room for violence.
On September 1 every year, children, parents, and families gather to celebrate what is known in Russia as the Day of Knowledge. It's on this day, after hearing speeches and critical information for the new year, that the first graders give flowers to what are described as the "last graders."
It was exactly on this day that Chechen terrorists chose to seize a school in Beslan, Russia. It was September 1, 2004, when Beslan Middle School Number One was stormed by a group of approximately 30 armed men and women. Over 1,300 hostages were taken, most of whom were children under the age of eighteen. At the end of three days, the hostage crisis culminated in a barrage of gunfire between the hostage takers and the Russian security forces.
When the dust had settled, 344 civilians were killed; 186 of them were children. You don't have to understand the complexities of Russian politics to know something went terribly wrong.
What happens inside a human being for an ideology to become more important than a human life?
Even those of us who disdain violence at every level could understand using force to protect the innocent, but how can any of us find a rationale for acts like this? How dark must a human soul become, how hard must a human heart become, to allow us to snuff out a life to simply make a point?
We stand in the midst of a human dilemma.
We long for community; we long to belong; we long for love.
Yet what we long for most we seem incapable of sustaining.
We are safer in the jungle than in the city.
We are our own worst enemies.
