Randy

“Clearly punishing the perpetrators of horrendous evils in hell forever and ever is not going to overcome horrendous evils in the lives of the victims, and it would certainly not be a display of God’s goodness to the criminals. Eternal conscious torment contributes nothing to God’s purposes of redeeming creation. In fact, it would “only multiply evil’s victories.”
― Gregory MacDonald, The Evangelical Universalist

“Hate can be a deeply stimulating emotion. The world becomes easier to understand and much less terrifying if you divide everything and everyone into friends and enemies, we and they, good and evil. The easiest way to unite a group isn't through love, because love is hard, It makes demands. Hate is simple.

So the first thing that happens in a conflict is that we choose a side, because that's easier than trying to hold two thoughts in our heads at the same time. The second thing that happens is that we seek out facts that confirm what we want to believe - comforting facts, ones that permit life to go on as normal. The third is that we dehumanize our enemy. There are many ways of doing that, but none is easier than taking her name away from her.

So when night comes and the truths spread, no one types "Maya" on their cell phone or computer in Beartown, they type "M." Or "the young woman." Or "the slut." No one talks about "the rape," they all talk about "the allegation." Or "the lie." It starts with "nothing happened," moves on to "and if anything did happen, it was voluntary," escalates to "and if it wasn't voluntary, she only has herself to blame; what did she think was going to happen if she got drunk and went into his room with him?" It starts with "she wanted it" and ends with "she deserved it."

It doesn't take long to persuade each other to stop seeing a person as a person. And when enough people are quiet for long enough, a handful of voices can give the impression that everyone is screaming.”
― Fredrik Backman, Beartown

“Prayer in Benedictine spirituality is not an interruption of our busy lives nor is it a higher act. Prayer is the filter through which we learn, if we listen hard enough, to see our world aright and anew and without which we live life with souls that are deaf and dumb and blind.”
― Joan Chittister

“But if we white Christians are going to get any critical leverage on our past, and the distortions this past has brought into our present, we have to let go of both the quest for self-protection—that is to say, the advantages we hoard at unjust costs to others—and the insistence on our racial and religious innocence.”
― Robert P. Jones, White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity