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The more important something is,
The more important it allows itself to be tested.
And that we allow that testing graciously,
Whether or not the test itself was particularly courteous.
We are all products of the society that birthed us.
Something we would do well to remember,
When reflecting on our actions as well as those of the people around us;
Our beliefs and perceptions too.
Do you want a reward for doing the right thing?
For serving life?
Congratulations, honour, an eternal afterlife or a place in the history books?
There are no certain rewards for such service.
There is only more to do,
Always.
The meaning of life?
To live.
All else is conjecture,
And the providence of faith,
Something that we can only define for ourselves,
And no one else.
Which is the greater test?
What we claim to believe,
Or what we use that belief to excuse?
Balance must be sought in all things:
Between reason and emotion,
Between the needs of the many and of the individual,
Between a victim’s justice and compassion for the accused,
Between science and faith,
Between our rights and our responsibilities,
Between work, family and self,
And so on.
Balance is difficult to find,
For matters are often simpler, more certain, at extremes,
And we must be wary of such.
Even when you think you have found your balance,
Test it,
Time and again,
To ensure it remains.
To use violence in defence of belief,
Or to promote a faith,
Or agenda,
Is absurd.
After all,
No mind was ever changed by a beating.
Violence hardens resistance,
And softens nothing.
Words are clumsy, inelegant things,
When it comes to describing the universe.
They are easily distorted,
Twisted so their original meaning is all but unrecognisable.
Some claim to know without doubt or question,
What this teacher, that prophet,
Or even their chosen divinity,
Truly meant by their words.
What foolish arrogance,
To claim their interpretation above all others as the only possible truth,
And denying even the merest possibility of error.
So, be careful that a healthy confidence in your beliefs,
Does not harden into dangerous fundamentalism.
If you wish to respect and keep to a tradition,
Then do so.
But neither complain about or berate,
Those who do not,
Nor smugly congratulate yourself for adhering to tradition,
As neither achieves anything worthwhile.
Holy War?
To kill in the name of life, of divinity?
One of the worst kinds of hypocrisy
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