Tempest and Tranquility

I have written on this before but feel led to do so again. The landscape of American politics embodies two essential goals.  The goals are:

• Individual Responsibility
• Human Compassion.

It is very clear that both of these goals are needed. It is also very clear that simpleminded application of either goal is harmful. To always insists solely on individual responsibility to meet every problem is downright cruel. But so also is the insistence that compassion meet every problem. Both must be seen as a twin set and both must govern.

The anatomies of both goals share the cogent power of purpose.  We find purpose in affirming individual responsibility, and we find purpose in affirming the need for compassion. That is, both contribute to our sense of meaning and both take on the morass of ultimatums and intellectual dilemmas that we often find ourselves inheriting when the mojo of symbols meet head-on the complexities of the world.

Therefore let us be kind to one another as we navigate swells of conflict and perplexity and likewise rejoice when we enter surprising seas of unity.

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