Opinions are the spades by which we are digging our own graves. Filled with venom and vapor, hurled at each other through mediums once used for familial photographs and palatable pleasures, opinions have become the source of great divisiveness and chasm.
Now and again, Heaven bends down and whispers, “Hush.”
The noise of today is deafening. Newscasters don’t report, they shout. Meteorologists stand in the eye of a storm proclaiming devastation before the first brush of a breeze. Activists leap to their soap boxes anticipating hate with a sort of sick eagerness.
Hush.
When parents calm a rattled child, they soften their voice, embrace the child, utter soothing words of comfort. Of reassurance. Of love. There is a lesson to be learned in this parental approach.
It is easy to assume that the horror of today is singular to the 21st century. Historians, of course, will be quick to counter this assumption with dates and briefings on humans’ longstanding rabid behavior. Mass violations of human rights, terrorism, unethical science experiments. Sanctioned genocides, exploitations, poisoning.
God calls us to listen. To be quiet. To abandon Self, if even temporarily, so as to hear His voice amidst the noise. To discern our own part in this space and time known as life. It seems that in our homo sapien-ness, we have forgotten… that life is finite.
We only have so much time to leave a mark on this world. How best would we like to leave our imprint? We are better than the spoils of hate. We are greater than the depth of conceit.
We can’t cure the evils of the world. But we can do our part individually and collectively. Resign ourselves to calmer rhetoric, temper our anger, dilute the fuel that sparks fiery debates. Place less emphasis on Self and greater respect toward the common good, the brotherhood of man.
In selflessness and grace, there is a voice calling through the noise. A divine reminder borne of the ultimate parental love.
Hush, Child. Hush.
Hush, Child. Hush.