Tag Archives: authoritarian thinking

Two Pandemics

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Posted by on in collaborating, Community, impediments, Inner Struggles, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

October 28, 2021- The viral scourge is ebbing, around these parts and in several other locations around the globe. In other areas, the stubborn Delta strain is proving to be far more than just a nuisance that keeps people from living the lives they had planned. It is, in those areas, a reminder that nothing can be accomplished, in the long run, without a personal commitment to healthful living. Without a robust immune system, any microbe can take root and develop into a “Superbug”. Fortunately, there are advances in organic diets and bona fide natural supplements that can help us to build such immune systems.

There is another pandemic, that of intolerance and false certitude. This is the pandemic of illiberalism, and it infects those on both ends of the political spectrum. We see it in the national governments of several countries-again, both ultraconservative and progressive. We see it in the pronouncements, on and offline, of authoritarian mindsets. I see it in the people who have turned on me, for making honest comments that don’t mesh with their own narrow views of how the world should be. Again, the only remedy for this is a robust immune system: Imperviousness to personal attacks, sudden emotional shutdowns and backs turned; a groundedness that sees one through attempts by others to shun and isolate.

I have had two doses of Moderna vaccine-at the behest of both my employer, Educational Services Incorporated and of the American Red Cross, with which I volunteer my services. Quite honestly, I feel no difference in my health and might possibly have managed to not become infected, given a commitment to using natural supplements and largely keeping to an organic diet. Yet, minimizing even that risk-even if it means running afoul of those who oppose the vaccinations, is not altogether a bad thing.

In adhering to my personal values, it has been reassuring to avoid being swept up in the political maelstroms that go in both directions and collide in the middle. I have lost friends on both the Right and on the Left-people who claim to love God above all else and others who claim to be filled with love for humanity. That love is very short-lived indeed, when they are faced with those of differing opinions. It all boils down to how one views the world.

So, ask yourselves- Which is most important: Loving people as they are and gently encouraging them to do better, or hammering people, relentlessly, until they toe the line you have drawn? I have a feeling that each knows the answer.

The Slow Healing

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Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, distraction issues, Education, impediments, Inner Struggles, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

June 24, 2021, Carson City- Several years ago a person, who claimed to be an adherent to the belief in Progressive Revelation, nonetheless made comments about people needing to be “in their place”. At the time, I just agreed to disagree, quietly sensing that time and circumstance would change that person’s heart.

My father, a fervent believer in the free enterprise system and in the right of individuals to make, and live with, their own choices in life, passed those beliefs on to the four of us who were of competence. I give a bit more leeway to non-capitalist systems, provided they avoid the top-down authoritarianism, to which most Marxist nations have subscribed; but I digress.

At the meeting I attended today, the very same group, who years ago acquiesced to the notion described in the first paragraph, had advanced, by leaps and bounds, to a place of broader mindedness-recognizing the imperative that society embrace all of its ethnicities and show more compassion towards immigrants.

Thus is the way of healing. Thus goes the path to true reconciliation. As a kindergartner cannot, customarily, comprehend calculus, so can a person raised in a largely homogeneous environment not, without a full-range of life experiences, comprehend the vastness of humanity’s variations. A well-read person can appreciate this multivariance, to some degree, and one who is truly well-traveled, who has mingled with many different nations and ethnicities, can appreciate it even more. The basis, the foundation, for such understanding, however, is set in childhood and cemented by experiences in adolescence and young adulthood. It requires a solid spirituality, albeit of the person’s own choosing. Otherwise, the healing that one must undergo, later in life, is a slow, tortuous and sometimes painful path.

The gathering this evening was a vindication of all that Baha’u’llah teaches us, in His Writings, and all that ‘Abdu’l-Baha showed us, by the example of His life. The group will now find its way to a very special place, as will any person, or group of people, who embrace the healing.