Daily Meditation for December 18, 2023

In 2002, Mr. Rogers (of television fame) said in a commencement address at Dartmouth College: “The world hangs like a magnificent jewel in the vastness of space. Every one of us is a part of that jewel—a facet of that jewel—and in the perspective of infinity, our differences are infinitesimal. We are intimately related. May we never even pretend that we are not.” The deep divide between people in American society today has sunk to the level of childish behaviors. Name-calling, bullying and bitter disagreement seem to have become “the new normal.” It’s hard, in such an environment, to believe that the differences between us “are infinitesimal.” We seem to be moving away from the pledge we make when we proclaim that we are “one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” Seeing our likenesses, not our differences to one another, allows the multifaceted beauty of our nation to shine.

By Christian Morris, OSB