I originally posted this on April 22, 2019. I see no reason to change a word of it.
The extent to which rage has become a common ingredient in politics (and spilling over into everyday life) is uncanny. It’s well documented how anger eats at your mind, your body, your very soul, and yet so much rhetoric is expended building rage.
Spend a few minutes reviewing the words of the average practicing politician of any stripe, and you will either find an angry man or woman, or you will hear words intended to make you angry.
Imagine if our chief export was peace.
Imagine if all the energy people channel into their rage was instead applied to love and mercy and trying to understand.
Imagine if, instead of expending fury, we fought just as hard to love our neighbors and smile on a brother.
In the end, the battle belongs to love. The ultimate triumph goes not to the one who shouted the loudest, whose hate was fiercest, whose arms were most powerful. No, victory belongs to the one who spoke most gently, whose love was most unshakable, and whose arms reached out in support.
Rage, a cousin of fear, is a disease that seeks to burn all in its path. Love will hold up the universe if need be.