we’re not just responsible for all we do, but for all we see, too. This frees us from blaming or judging anybody. (In this, it echoes my Catholic notion of original sin—we’re all the same!) “Great bodhisattvas get sick and die from taking on the suffering of others. They pray to be reborn in hell.” (Hell being the first place Jesus went after the cross.) Reading Michael Herr puts you in touch not just with the brutality we humans are capable of, but with some nobility that persists and persists and is made glorious by refusing defeat in horror’s presence. It’s not sweet and noble to die for
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