In the first half of life, success, security, and containment—“looking good” to ourselves and others—are almost the only questions. They are the early stages in Maslow's “hierarchy of needs.”1 In a culture like ours, still preoccupied with security issues, enormously high military budgets are never seriously questioned by Congress or by the people, while appropriations reflecting later stages in the hierarchy of needs, like those for education, health care for the poor, and the arts, are quickly cut, if even considered. The message is clear that we are largely an adolescent culture. Religions,
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