I on occasion will post something political. Most of the time, I’m not a fan of politics or political posts of any kind.

I think mostly that’s because they end up being a lot of diatribes and rhetoric that sounds a lot more like talking at people (or better yet, talking down to people) than talking to people.

More than ever before, I believe that we need less rhetoric and more respect. We need less diatribe and more dialogue. We need most of all to talk less, listen more, and find a common ground of understanding.

It does no good to belittle your opposition and call them names. That does nothing to solve issues or address injustices. All that does is create and sustain a wall of division.

I also believe that you gain the power and authority to speak into the lives of others only as you listen to others. Really listen, and not just hear to respond. After all, you have one mouth and two ears for a reason.

I think we find when we listen and communicate respectfully with a view to understanding rather than to being proven right, we find that we are more alike than we originally thought. We find that we are all human beings searching for peace and purpose in a sometimes very chaotic world.

I’d also add that a dose of humility would do wonders in our quest to find understanding. My point of view isn’t necessarily better than yours, just different. I might have something I can learn from you, as well as you from me, by engaging in a dialogue rather than yelling and slinging epithets at each other from a distance.

I love the prayer of St. Francis and I think it seems a very appropriate way to sum up everything I’ve said previously:

“Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace;
where there is hatred let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.”