Liberation is not deliverance.
Victor Hugo
Yesterday on the 5th of May my country celebrated the liberation from five years of occupation and oppression by Nazi Germany, now 62 years ago. In May 1945 American and Canadian tanks rolled into Dutch cities to a rousing welcome by people who had survived the winter eating little more than flower bulbs.
After the liberation, the wounds of war took a long time to heal. In a recent opinion poll, one in two people in Holland said that the two countries should work together more closely in the European Union. However, a large majority said they would now welcome Germans to join the national memorial day on May 4th. As Victor Hugo implied, the journey from liberation to deliverance can take some time.
Meanwhile, violence and oppression continue unabated in today’s world. Only a few days ago, soldiers in Iraq discovered a girls school under construction which had been booby trapped to cause carnage with an intent that was considered inconceivable until now. No day passes in that country without reports of further bombings that violently tear apart the fabric of society.
Across the Atlantic in the US, tales of carnage in schools also continue, yet the thirst for violence remains unquenched. The latest Hollywood product for family entertainment, Spiderman 3, is rated by the Motion Picture Association of America as PG 13 for its “sequences of intense action violence”. In the Philippines, the Movie and Television Classification Board rated the movie GP (for general patronage) without age limit, and when I watched it yesterday, even babies were admitted.
A reader from Africa blamed the editor of Newsweek this week for a negative article on Ban Ki-moon’s prospects as Secretary-General of the UN, saying that “you and George Bush are made from the same material: you find it easier to destroy than to build up.”
Watching Hollywood movies like Spiderman 3, destruction looks easy and spectacular, and the aftermath is made to look inconsequential to the stars shown to occupy the moral high ground.
Now switch your mind to another wavelength...
Simultaneous to what seems to be an unrelenting momentum for destruction, the world is also being touched by waves of positive energy at a scale never seen before.
Gurus and coaches, many of them American or resident in the US, abound with positive messages. The self-help or self-enrichment shelves of bookstores around the world are filled like never before.
Yesterday on the 5th of May my country celebrated the liberation from five years of occupation and oppression by Nazi Germany, now 62 years ago. In May 1945 American and Canadian tanks rolled into Dutch cities to a rousing welcome by people who had survived the winter eating little more than flower bulbs.
After the liberation, the wounds of war took a long time to heal. In a recent opinion poll, one in two people in Holland said that the two countries should work together more closely in the European Union. However, a large majority said they would now welcome Germans to join the national memorial day on May 4th. As Victor Hugo implied, the journey from liberation to deliverance can take some time.
Meanwhile, violence and oppression continue unabated in today’s world. Only a few days ago, soldiers in Iraq discovered a girls school under construction which had been booby trapped to cause carnage with an intent that was considered inconceivable until now. No day passes in that country without reports of further bombings that violently tear apart the fabric of society.
Across the Atlantic in the US, tales of carnage in schools also continue, yet the thirst for violence remains unquenched. The latest Hollywood product for family entertainment, Spiderman 3, is rated by the Motion Picture Association of America as PG 13 for its “sequences of intense action violence”. In the Philippines, the Movie and Television Classification Board rated the movie GP (for general patronage) without age limit, and when I watched it yesterday, even babies were admitted.
A reader from Africa blamed the editor of Newsweek this week for a negative article on Ban Ki-moon’s prospects as Secretary-General of the UN, saying that “you and George Bush are made from the same material: you find it easier to destroy than to build up.”
Watching Hollywood movies like Spiderman 3, destruction looks easy and spectacular, and the aftermath is made to look inconsequential to the stars shown to occupy the moral high ground.
Now switch your mind to another wavelength...
Simultaneous to what seems to be an unrelenting momentum for destruction, the world is also being touched by waves of positive energy at a scale never seen before.
Gurus and coaches, many of them American or resident in the US, abound with positive messages. The self-help or self-enrichment shelves of bookstores around the world are filled like never before.
Spirituality is making a “comeback” on a grand scale and in all colors of the rainbow. The blogosphere and other new avenues of communication are making a big contribution to this global “new age” movement.
The past weeks have witnessed a spectacular upsurge in global awareness of the need to counter the environmental destruction and climate change that are affecting the planet.
The remarkable news was about the growing consensus for action to be taken. Scientists and government officials have suddenly found more common ground for moving forward with action, and mindsets have changed in ways and on a scale that politicians can no longer afford to ignore.
In Spiderman 3, Peter Parker concludes that in the battle of good and bad, we always have a choice. Adversity can be overcome.
And two and a half thousand years ago, the Buddha told mankind to “be a lamp unto yourself” and he encouraged his followers to “work out your liberation with diligence.”
In the past few days, my daughter discovered the law of attraction from reading Rhonda Byrne’s book The Secret.
It’s about the power of positive thinking. According to Wikipedia, this law states that “you get what you think about; your thoughts determine your destiny”. That can work both ways.
That violence begets more violence seems clear. And in the dualistic nature of our world, violence seems to cling to liberation like a shadow. Even so, the world’s gurus and coaches keep reminding us that we can experience liberation when we release ourselves from aggression and fear inside.
In our daily struggle between good and bad, the choice to experience deliverance is ours, at a deeply personal level. Ask Peter Parker and the Dutch – they seem to have found some practical answers. Or read The Secret and focus on positive thinking.
Photograph: Flowering from the mud – one of the most widely circulated photographs in the world (Water Lilies, from Microsoft’s sample pictures)
That violence begets more violence seems clear. And in the dualistic nature of our world, violence seems to cling to liberation like a shadow. Even so, the world’s gurus and coaches keep reminding us that we can experience liberation when we release ourselves from aggression and fear inside.
In our daily struggle between good and bad, the choice to experience deliverance is ours, at a deeply personal level. Ask Peter Parker and the Dutch – they seem to have found some practical answers. Or read The Secret and focus on positive thinking.
Photograph: Flowering from the mud – one of the most widely circulated photographs in the world (Water Lilies, from Microsoft’s sample pictures)
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