Guess I have always been a bit of a philosopher. Remember how my college friends and I would spend hours after dinner in the student union discussing the “meaning of life.” They urged me to write a book. I believe it is time and have begun the first chapters. The USA and world appears to be collapsing into darkness. Love and compassion are rare commodities.
I went to college in the Mormon-dominated area of southeastern Idaho. Although I respected many principles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, they didn’t allow Black people to ascend to the Priesthood at that time. The Church maintained a racist, Jim Crow position. I was an athlete and stood with my Black teammates against this discrimination.
As we approach Veterans Day, I recall a quote that distinguishes the service of those — all who gave some, and some who gave all:
Greater Love Has No One Than This, Than To Lay Down One’s Life For His Friends
I learned as a young man to distrust the teachings of churches and “man.” Yet I’ve always been a follower of Jesus Christ. To me, Jesus represents love and compassion. Even two thousand years ago, his teachings were intensely unpopular. Natives crucified Jesus! He laid down His Life for all of us. Has there ever been such a display of love and compassion?
Increasing Drop in Church Membership and Attendance
Church membership and attendance has declined rapidly over the past twenty years. Obviously, love and compassion doesn’t exist only in churches, and some church-goers demonstrate the highest absence of love and compassion, but it is a reasonable proxy measure of society’s commitment to love and compassion.
Racial and Ethnic Groups by Religious Attendance
% of adults who identify as…
What matters in life is not great deeds, but great love.
Further, as a group Asian Americans have established their prowess in deeds. They excel in school; are highly respected in the workplace; and demand their children work hard. One of my role models, Consuelo Zobel de Ayala y Montojo Terrentegui Zambrano Alger, was inspired from her earliest days by the words of St. Therese of the Little Flower of the Child Jesus, who said, “What matters in life is not great deeds, but great love.”
According to a Pew Research Center survey of Asian Americans, Christians are the largest religious group among U.S. Asian adults (42%), and the unaffiliated are second (26%). Buddhists are third, accounting for about one-in-seven Asian Americans (14%), followed by Hindus (10%), Muslims (4%) and Sikhs (1%). Followers of other religions make up 2% of U.S. Asians. [source]
Are Asians lacking in love and compassion? Although Hawai’i is the aloha state, it is a brutal and cruel place. Blame Asians? My Asian friends are kind and compassionate. Blame those who do not attend church regularly? Jesus is considered the Most Compassionate of all. He didn’t attend church. What is missing?
Last week, controversial entertainer Kanye West released a new album, Jesus is King. It’s his ninth studio album. Kanye likens his evolution to a person who is sleeping. He says one who is asleep doesn’t know they are asleep. Only when they wake up can they see their past limitations. Kanye claims he lived much of his life asleep. Now, he woke up. People wonder why his smile is so effusive and beaming.
Albert Einstein on Love
Einstein placed his letter in his daughter’s safe-keeping and instructed she not publish it “for decades” after his death “until society is advanced enough to accept” its contents.
“If we want our species to survive, if we are to find meaning in life, if we want to save the world and every sentient being that inhabits it, love is the one and only answer.”
Albert Einstein
EINSTEIN’S LETTER TO HIS DAUGHTER LIESERI:
“When I proposed the theory of relativity, very few understood me, and what I will reveal now to transmit to mankind will also collide with the misunderstanding and prejudice in the world. I ask you to guard the letters as long as necessary, years, decades, until society is advanced enough to accept what I will explain below.
There is an extremely powerful force that, so far, science has not found a formal explanation to. It is a force that includes and governs all others, and is even behind any phenomenon operating in the universe and has not yet been identified by us.
This universal force is LOVE
When scientists looked for a unified theory of the universe, they forgot the most powerful unseen force.
Love is Light that enlightens those who give and receive it. Love is gravity because it makes some people feel attracted to others. Love is power because it multiplies the best we have and allows humanity not to be extinguished in their blind selfishness. Love unfolds and reveals. For love, we live and die. Love is God and God is Love.
This force explains everything and gives meaning to life. This is the variable that we have ignored for too long, maybe because we are afraid of love because it is the only energy in the universe that man has not learned to drive at will.
To give visibility to love, I made a simple substitution in my most famous equation. If instead of E = mc2, we accept that the energy to heal the world can be obtained through love multiplied by the speed of light squared, we arrive at the conclusion that love is the most powerful force there is, because it has no limits.
After the failure of humanity in the use and control of the other forces of the universe that have turned against us, it is urgent that we nourish ourselves with another kind of energy.
If we want our species to survive, if we are to find meaning in life, if we want to save the world and every sentient being that inhabits it, love is the one and only answer. Perhaps we are not yet ready to make a bomb of love, a device powerful enough to entirely destroy the hate, selfishness and greed that devastate the planet. However, each individual carries within them a small but powerful generator of love whose energy is waiting to be released.
When we learn to give and receive this universal energy, dear Lieserl, we will have affirmed that love conquers all and is able to transcend everything and anything because love is the quintessence of life.
I deeply regret not having been able to express what is in my heart which has quietly beaten for you all my life. Maybe it’s too late to apologize, but as time is relative, I need to tell you that I love you and, thanks to you, I have reached the ultimate answer!
Your father,
Albert Einstein
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Ko’olau of Kaua’i. I am the Defiant One
“I Believe We Can”
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Amen. Love is definitely the answer. That God is love is undeniable.
Sadly, Trumpism is replacing Christianity. https://petersironwood.wordpress.com/2017/01/09/trumpism-is-a-new-religion/
Thanks for the thoughts. Enjoyed your conclusion, “Our entire society needs to become more patient, less greedy, more cooperative, less competitive in matters that don’t require competition, more accepting and less self-righteous.”