Humanity

    Humanity.
    There are some days I want to throw my hands up and declare that I am done with you all. That I hate you all. As if I am better than you. As if I am smarter and kinder and wiser.
    I am not.
    You are all so, so intricate. There's so much nuance and so many shades of colors for every situation and person. It's beautiful and confusing and scaring and exciting and I love you.
    Isn't it so special that all of these differences combine not to make us unique, yet equal? You've a spirit and a mind and a body; one cannot be taken from the other. It's yours uniquely but we all have these three and so we are equal in value.

    If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh?
   -William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice.

   Us. Us! We are in essence united, humanity, glorious creations.

    "Look!" I shout. I point to the four prisoners who lie docilely on the earth, their lips to the pole, their hands clasped to their faces like monkeys' paws, oblivious of the hammer, ignorant of what is going on behind them, relieved that the offending mark has been beaten from their backs, hoping that the punishment is at an end. 
    "Look! I shout. "We are the great miracle of creation! But from some blows this miraculous body cannot repair itself! How -!"
    Words fail me.
    "Look at these men!" I recommence. "Men!" 
    Those in the crowd who can crane to look at the prisoners, even at the flies that begin to settle on their bleeding welts.
    -J.M. Coetzee, Waiting for the Barbarians

    Men. At the end of the day, all we are is human, and maybe that word means so much more than we assume.
    My God. My God, do you not see? Sexism and racism and classism and condemnation and abuse are atrocities against people who are as valuable as us. How many times do we beat the "barbarians" who are different than us?
    This isn't to say there's no right or wrong, no punishments or corrections to be given. There must be, because fault happens, we are imperfect sinners all of us. But justice and mercy are not opposites; sometimes, they are the same. And this isn't to say that, being human, we have the right to trample animals "beneath our feet" (Okay, I'm quoting Coetzee again). I just wish we could treasure each other.

     So he answered and said, “ ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind,’ and ‘your neighbor as yourself.’”
    -Luke 10: 27-28.

    It seems to me that if we really love God, the God who created all of us and who loves us passionately, who gives us His life for our own and the His Spirit to walk through life, then we ought to love our neighbors as our own by default. In fact, if we see how amazingly we have all been created, to interact with billions of unique people, we are showing love and possibly worshiping Him who made us.
    Just some musings of mine. Let me know yours. :)


Love,
Kelley