Tolerance

I have been wrestling of late with a hard idea. Wresting, struggling... these are the words. I am overcome by this issue again and again. Like the guardian at the gate, it refuses to move until I learn the answer, speak the password, guess Rumplestiltskin's name.

I am tolerant. I am exceedingly tolerant and pluralist in all things. I want to welcome everyone, learn from everyone, create a place for everyone. My problem is the specific issue of intolerance. How can I welcome and learn from people who will not welcome or learn from me, or my brother, or my best friend? How can I pry open my heart to people who keep theirs blind, deaf, and dead to the world?

I should feed my enemies. I should invite them to the feast and serve them in any way I can; make my open heart their home and lead by example. These last few weeks I have not been able to get there. All I can think about is marching on temples, creating fear to match the fear they have set upon our state... In short, all I can think of is revenge and counterstrike.

Intellectually, I know this is folly and worse than folly. This is the road to war.

I found myself on this road for the first time this November. The pit of my stomach grows icy with rage, my chest burns, and I want my pain to spread. I trudge up this rocky road, burning and cursing and not thinking. My better nature is the hint of a hint of a faraway drum, but my primal need for vengeance is beating a fever pace up and over this hill into enemy territory. Once there, I can think only of bringing this struggle to hellish fruition. The road I travel is littered with concepts and words and laws and boundaries, all cast aside upon the road to battle. Over the rest of the hill, I find only dead men and women who can no longer see those causes for which they fought and fell. I know this is not my road. I am surprised at myself for walking it. I can leave my weapons here with the dead; I trust them to let no one take them up again. I can turn around and walk home.

I'm not going to say I'm not angry anymore. I am still very angry and that keeps a candle burning on what is yet to be done. But our people need not fight on the other side of that hill.

We have found something to fight for. We don't have to settle for a few small-minded groups to fight against.

We must build a new world. We must not be afraid. And yes, we must serve our enemies, invite them to the feast, and endure their ignorance until they learn. They will learn. Their children will learn. Tolerance for all, equality to all.

Times will change.

We shall overcome.

So mote it be.