The Purpose of Life is Love

This post is the third in my series on the 4-Ls. (Those of you who didn’t see the previous posts or want to review them can click here for the March 9 post and here for the one on March 30.)

The second of the 4-Ls is love, and the title of this article comes from the following words by Leo Tolstoy:

The purpose of life is loving, the penetration of everything with love. It is the slow and gradual change from evil to good, it is the creation of the real life, the life filled with love (A Calendar of Wisdom, p. 249). 

As I began teaching Christian Studies in Japan, I soon realized that most of my students were not only quite disinterested in Christianity but that they were also not much interested in traditional Japanese religions either.

Many students, however, were interested in thinking about the meaning of life (the first of the 4-Ls) and of love.

Few of my students had ever heard of or knew little about  Kagawa Toyohiko, a Japanese Christian. But the life and work of Kagawa (1888~1960), who obviously lived a life of love for others, was appealing to many of them.*¹

And while many students were negative toward the racism they knew existed in the U.S., which they generally regarded as a Christian country, they were impressed by the life and work of Martin Luther King, Jr., and by his book Strength to Love (1963; Japanese translation, 1965).*²

So, I focused increasingly on how Christianity had been, and is being, expressed in loving actions and less on the doctrinal expressions of the Christian religion.

Understanding the distinctively Christian meaning of love is of great importance. In English, “love” is used in many different ways. For example, a man may say he loves his wife at one time and then in a different conversation say he loves ice cream.

C.S. Lewis, the English writer and popular theologian, sought to clarify that diversity in his widely-read book Four Loves (1960). One of those four was called agape in the Greek New Testament, and that word articulates the particularly Christian form of love.

The word “love” is not used as much in Japanese as in English. Rather than the word for love (愛、ai), Japanese people are more prone to say like (好きsuki) or really like (大好き、daisuki). But to emphasize the distinctive meaning of agape as used in the New Testament, I used holy love（聖愛、seiai).

Here is how that is written in Japanese calligraphy on the hanging wall scroll I introduced in the March 9 blog post: 

 The basis of Christian love is God’s love for us, but I am writing here only about our love for others, or the lack thereof.*³

In the Gospels, Jesus stated clearly that following the commandment “Love the Lord your God…,” the second greatest commandment is “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Mark 12:30-31, NIV).

This is a commandment, though, that is definitely difficult to obey. How often do we really love our “neighbor” as much as we love ourselves? And remember that Jesus taught that a neighbor is any hurting/needy person who we have the opportunity to help (see Luke 10:25~37).

Some of the “Church Fathers” spoke plainly, and challengingly, about such neighbor-love. Consider these words of Basil of Caesarea (330~370):

The bread in your cupboard belongs to the hungry man; the coat hanging in your closet belongs to the man who needs it; the shoes rotting in your closet belong to the man who has no shoes; the money which you put into the bank belongs to the poor. You do wrong to everyone you could help but fail to help.

I am not sharing these disturbing words to make us feel guilty, as perhaps we all are. But if the purpose of life is loving, as Tolstoy wrote, seeking to love God and to love our neighbors is, truly, the key to experiencing life to the fullest.

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*¹ Here is a link to the blog article I posted about Kagawa in July 2013.

*² The first of several blog posts about King was in January 2010. I also wrote about his explanation regarding Christian love in a September 2018 post, in which I also made reference to chapters #22 and #25 in my book Thirty True Things Everyone Needs to Know Now (published in 2020).

*³ Earlier this week, I  posted a brief article about the hymn “The Love of God” on my alternative blogsite, and I encourage you to read it by clicking here.

On Having and Celebrating Life, Real/Eternal Life

Life ◈ Love ◈ Light ◈ Liberty: These are the “4-Ls” about which I wrote in my March 9 post. Today I am focusing on Life, the first of those four. Over the next few weeks, I will write about the other three.

Real life is more than physical life. As I said in the March 9 post, the foundation of my emphasis on life was Jesus’ words as recorded in the tenth chapter of the Gospel of John: “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly” (v. 10, NRSV).

Having abundant life focuses on the quality of life, not just its quantity. Physical life is something that people either have or don’t have. That is, they are either alive or dead. But living abundantly means living with meaning, purpose, and joy.

The emphasis on life, real life, was prominent in the Christian Studies courses I conducted at Seinan Gakuin University in Japan. In 1975, I taught a required course for second-year Economics Department students. Horiuchi Akira-san was one of the students enrolled in that class.

On his 70^th birthday in January, Horiuchi-san posted the following comments (in Japanese) on Facebook: “When I was a second year university student, a missionary teacher of Christian Studies said, "The purpose of Christianity is to help people to have life and to have it abundantly."

In a personal exchange on Facebook Messenger, Horiuchi-san (whom I should call sensei since he has been a Christian pastor for most of the years since he finished his theological education in 1981) wrote, “I am who I am today because of my encounter with you. Thanks.”

Real life includes valuing and protecting physical life. Even though it is more than physical life, having real life leads to more than just enjoying the richness of one’s own life. It also seeks life for groups of people, robust physical life as well as meaningful societal life.

This generates opposition to war, to violence of all kinds, to capital punishment, to ecological destruction, and to all exploitation and/or degradation of people because of race, nationality, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or anything else.  

Conservative Christians of the present have preserved the important emphasis of evangelicalism on real life for individuals by faith in God through Jesus Christ, but so many have largely failed to emphasize the equally important matter of helping marginalized groups to have vigorous physical life also.

The New Testament term eternal life is basically the same as what I call real life. I have used the latter term because of the misunderstanding or ambiguity of the word eternal, which was long expressed as everlasting in English.

For centuries, the majority of Protestants (including most Anglicans) read the King James Version of the Bible, which dates back to 1611. Many of us older people memorized John 3:16 in the KJV:

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

That was the basis for the widespread belief in unending life, which was generally understood as life after physical death.

But beginning with the American Standard Version, published in 1901, the Greek words previously translated as everlasting life began to be translated as eternal life. This became more widely the case after the Revised Standard Version was published in 1952.

Bible scholars increasingly began to emphasize that eternal, especially in the Gospel of John, primarily refers to the quality of life, not its quantity. Thus, eternal life is the type of life that we can have and enjoy now, not just life after physical death.

Life (real life) is the theme of Easter, which Christians around the world will be celebrating tomorrow.

It is because of the resurrected Jesus that all can receive new life = eternal life through him. That is the life that Horiuchi-san received the year after he heard about real life in my Christian Studies class in 1975.

His kind words of gratitude were primarily for my sharing the Gospel of life with him and his classmates, most of whom never accepted that message. He did and that made all the difference.

Happy Easter!

The 4-Ls: Life ◈ Love ◈ Light ◈ Liberty

The header at the top of all my blog posts contains the words “Reflections about Life, Love, Light, and Liberty.” Those are the 4-Ls that I have emphasized for years and about which I am finally explaining in this blog post. 

Some of you may have wondered why more of my blog articles are not more “religious” or more explicitly “Christian.” Many of you know that I was ordained as a Christian minister at the age of 18 and that I served for 38 years as a missionary in Japan.

True, some of my blog posts are clearly Christian and/or religious. But many could, conceivably, have been written by one who is neither Christian nor religious as that word is generally understood.

But with a few exceptions, most of my blog posts are directly related to life, love, light, and liberty, the 4-Ls, and those words are basic concepts of the Christian faith and at the core of my life and work.

In 1995 after I had been elected as Chancellor of Seinan Gakuin, the large educational institution in Japan where I had been a university faculty member since 1968, a local newspaper reporter asked me what I would be emphasizing as the head of what was widely known as a “Christian school.”

Beginning at least in a 1994 Christmas sermon in a school Chapel service, I talked about four words that began with the letter L in English. (Those words are known by any Japanese person with a high school education.) So that is what I told the reporter I would be emphasizing.

Not long after I was installed as chancellor, Nakamura Kunie-san, one of my supporting staff members, presented me with the following wall hanging that I kept in my office during the eight years I served as chancellor—and have had hanging above my desk here in the States ever since retirement in 2004.

On the back, Nakamura-san pasted an explanation of the simple image, saying they were the four Ls: Life (生命), Love (聖愛), Light (公明), Liberty (自由). (The Japanese words do not begin with an L sound; they are pronounced seimei, seiai, kōmei, and jiyū.*)

Most of my Japanese students were not interested in religion when I began teaching Christian Studies at Seinan Gakuin University (SGU) in 1968—and that remained so during my three decades teaching required courses in what was founded as, and continued as, a Christian school.

Not long after starting my teaching career at SGU, I came across a book titled ABC’s of Christian Faith (1968) by Union Theological Seminary professor James D. Smart (1906~82). I was impressed by that book and its unifying theme: “Life in God.”

After reading Smart’s book which emphasized that Christianity at its core was not about religion but about life, I decided that since I was teaching an introductory course on Christian beliefs, I would relate my lectures to how Jesus came not to start a new religion but to help people live a meaningful life.

The foundation of that emphasis was Jesus’ words as recorded in the tenth chapter of the Gospel of John: “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly” (v. 10, NRSV).**

Later, love became a central theme in the new course on Christian ethics that I developed. While there continued to be considerable disinterest in religion, students were generally interested in learning about people who lived lives exhibiting Christian love.

Then through the years, I also began to emphasize the Christian emphasis on light as well as liberty, so by the mid-1990s, the 4-Ls were prominent enough in my mind to make them the focal point of my work as head of Seinan Gakuin, the educational institution with around 10,000 students and pupils.

I wanted then to speak meaningfully to the mostly non-Christian students, staff, and faculty at Seinan Gakuin in Japan. And now I want to write these blog articles so that those who are not, or no longer, active Christians will also find them thought-provoking and relevant for the living of these days.

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 * The image at the top of this post is the center of a large hanging scroll which I received as a gift at the end of my term as Chancellor. The Japanese words for the 4-Ls are written by stylized brush strokes and are read from top to bottom and from right to left.

** I plan to write more about Life in my March 30 blog post and about Love, Light, and Liberty over the next several weeks. 

They’ll Know We are Christians by Our ??

In this last blog post before Christmas, I am writing about the central message of Christmas and also writing about what I want both those of you who are Christians, as well as those who are not, to read and think about deeply.

Christmas is the celebration of love. This past Sunday was the fourth Sunday of Advent, and the theme for that last Sunday before Christmas was love.

There are various Advent traditions and practices, but according to the Christianity.com website, the selected Bible passage for Dec. 18 was the third chapter of John, with those best-known words of the Bible, 

The longstanding practice of giving Christmas presents is largely rooted in the gifts of the Magi who came from afar and presented gifts to baby Jesus. But the first and greatest Christmas gift was none other than God’s loving gift of Jesus himself to humankind.

Christians were long known for their love. “They’ll know we are Christians by our love,” is one title given for a gospel song written in the 1960s by Peter Schottes, a Catholic priest.

In the 1970s and ’80s, I enjoyed singing that song with Christian friends and fellow church members in Japan. Here is its second verse and the chorus:

We will walk with each other, will walk hand in hand,
We will walk with each other, will walk hand in hand,
And together we’ll spread the news, that God is in our land

And they’ll know we are Christians,
By our love, by our love.
Yes, they’ll know we are Christians by our love.*

The lyrics of that gospel song are loosely based on words of Jesus as recorded in the Gospel of John: “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” (13:35, NIV)

In addition, though, until perverted by its alliance with political power, Christianity from its beginning was a religion of love for all people—and it still is when it is faithful to Jesus Christ.

Some Christians are now known for their hate. In my Dec. 10 blog post, I introduced Octavia Butler and her two dystopian novels. I have just finished reading the second of those, Parable of the Talents (1998).

In that prescient book, the U.S. elects a new President in 2032, a man who is an ardent advocate of Christian nationalism. In fact, he formed a new denomination, the Church of Christian America (CA).

The most alarming characteristic of that new church is its horrendous persecution of those considered to be “infidels.” Lauren, the protagonist of both novels, experiences unthinkable suffering at the hands of fanatical CA believers. They, indeed, were “Christians” known for their hate.

Perhaps you have seen the recent news stories about a restaurant that refused to serve a Christian group because of what they deemed was the “hatred” of that anti-gay group toward their employees.

Metzger Bar and Butchery in Richmond, Va., posted on Instagram (here) that they “denied service to the group to protect its staff, many of whom are women or members of the LGBTQ+ community.”

After reading about that happening, I came across a YouTube video titled “Hate Preachers: Bigotry and Fearmongering by Extremist Christian ‘Leaders’.” That video includes several clips of preachers saying almost unbelievable things, especially about LGBTQ people.**

Posted on YouTube eight months ago, that video has had 117,000 views, and when I accessed it last week, the first of the more than 1,600 comments said, “I simply don’t have enough hatred in me to be a Christian.”

How exceedingly sad that this is how some people view Christians now!

During this Christmas week, my plea for all of us is that we will fully accept the love of God manifested on that first Christmas and broadly implement that love. And, indeed, may all of us Christians be increasingly known by our love for all people.

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* Here is the link to a YouTube video with those words being nicely sung.

** Some of these are affiliated with New Independent Fundamentalist Baptist churches, a relatively new organization you can read about here. 

Subverting the Culture of Contempt

The President has been impeached. But more about that next time. This article is about seeking to subvert the “culture of contempt” that was so evident in the impeachment hearings. The message of Advent (and Christmas) is hope, peace, love, and joy. How we need this message in the U.S. where the culture of contempt is so prevalent—and yes, so contemptible!

Help from Arthur Brooks

Arthur C. Brooks, the Washington Post columnist and professor of public leadership at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, is the author of a book published in March of this year. You have previously heard the words of the title of that book: Love Your Enemies.

That is certainly not an original title—but the subtitle is: How Decent People Can Save America from the Culture of Contempt.

Brooks (b. 1964) is a political conservative, and I disagree with many of his political positions. But I fully agree with what he writes in his new book—and with Nebraska Republican Senator Ben Sasse, who is quoted on the back cover of the book:

If you are satisfied with our toxic ideological climate, then don’t bother reading this book. But if you’d like to rebel against the present nonsense, Arthur Brooks can show you how to do it with joy and confidence—regardless of your political preferences. If we follow the lessons in Love Your Enemies, better times lie ahead for America. 

Help from These Five Rules

In the Conclusion, Brooks advocates “Five Rules to Subvert the Culture of Contempt.” Rather than repeating his five rules, I am sharing a helpful statement about each one.

1) “Stand up to people on your own side who trash people on the other side.” Since contempt is destructive, whenever we read or hear words of contempt, to subvert the culture of contempt we need to speak up, kindly, in opposition to those words.

2) “Seeking out what those on the other side have to say will help you understand others better.” Whenever we read or hear words with which we strongly disagree, we first need to seek to understand why the writer/speaker wrote or spoke such words.

3) Here is a point that Brooks makes repeatedly: “never treat others with contempt, even if you believe they deserve it.” Contempt never causes others to change for the better and is “always harmful for the contemptor.”

4) Brooks also encourages his readers to “disagree better” and to “be part of a healthy competition of ideas.” He writes, “The single biggest way a subversive can change America is not by disagreeing less, but by disagreeing better—engaging in earnest debate while still treating everyone with love and respect.”  

5) Finally, Brooks advocates tuning out, disconnecting more from unproductive debates. “Unfollow public figures [and social media ‘friends’] who foment contempt, even if you agree with them.”

Trying It Out

Partly because of Brooks’s book, I have been reading, and trying to understand without contempt, two books with which I have strong disagreements.

Dark Agenda: The Way to Destroy Christian America (2018) was written by David Horowitz, the son of Jewish parents who in 2015 identified as an agnostic. Even though Jewish, Horowitz (b. 1939) dedicated his book to his wife and to three “Christian buddies.”

And on the back cover, Horowitz’s book receives praise from the ultra-conservative Christian politician Mike Huckabee.

Reading some of that book with the desire to subvert the culture of contempt helped me understand why Horowitz, and many religious and political conservatives, think the way they do.

Although the book contains much I strongly disagree with, reading it with the goal of gaining deeper insight into why conservatives think the way they do was beneficial. And I realize afresh that I can view Horowitz as a good and honorable man—even though wrong in many of his ideas!—without having contempt for him.

The same goes for Star Parker, author of Necessary Noise: How Donald Trump Inflames the Culture War and Why This is Good News for America (2019). Parker (b. 1956) is an active Christian as well as an African American woman who has been a strong supporter of President Trump.

During the Christmas season—and throughout the new year—let’s work together to subvert the culture of contempt, for the good of the country and the world.

Merry Christmas to all!

TTT #25 Love is More an Attitude and Action than a Feeling

This article is almost entirely from just one part of the 25^th chapter of my as-yet-unpublished book Thirty True Things Everyone Needs to Know Now (TTT). After you finish reading this article, I encourage you to click here and read the other three parts of that chapter.

King’s Explanation

In the 22^nd chapter of TTT, I referred to Martin Luther King Jr.’s book of sermons, Strength to Love (1963). In the chapter titled “Loving Your Enemies,” King explains that “love is not to be confused with some sentimental outpouring.” What’s more, this love is “something much deeper than emotional bosh.”

After writing about the difference between the Greek term agape and two other Greek words translated love, King then seeks to make a clear distinction between the meaning of the English word like from the meaning of love as a translation of agape.

King notes that Jesus did not say, “Like your enemies”—which is a good thing, King emphasizes, since it is “almost impossible to like some people.” No, in commanding his followers to love, Jesus was speaking about agape, which is “creative, redemptive goodwill” for all people. Thus, it is entirely possible to love people we do not like.

A Woman’s Disagreement

Many years ago when I was explaining this in a sermon to a small congregation in Japan, one woman started shaking her head in disagreement. In discussing the matter with her later, she was adamant that loving is a feeling and basically the same thing as liking others.

But she was wrong—and it is very important to realize that agape is not a feeling or an emotion. It is an attitude and is expressed in action. Thus, that kind of love is something that can be commanded.

Although my parents reported that I was a rather “picky” eater as a child, for most of my adult life my dislikes have been few. But there is one food above all others that I have never liked: raw cucumbers.

My mother could have forced me to eat cucumbers; parents regularly devise ways to get children to eat more or a variety of food.

But what if she had demanded that I like cucumbers? That would have been an impossible demand. Somehow she might have been able to get me to eat cucumbers, but there is presumably nothing she could have done to make me like them.

Agape love, however, is something that can be commanded.

Jesus’ Command

If loving is an emotion, such as liking is an emotion, then Jesus’ command that his followers love others, even enemies, would have been impossible to carry out—and therefore meaningless.

One cannot command someone else to have certain emotions, feelings, or likes. But attitudes are different. We can change our attitudes by our willpower, and we can act on the basis of attitudes in ways that run contrary to our feelings.

If love is an attitude—if its nature is to value a person in such ways as actively to seek his or her deepest welfare and fulfillment—then, if we choose, we can will to love others, even our enemies.

Certainly, that is not easy to do; it is more natural to act upon our feelings—such as hatred, which is an emotion. 

The love Jesus commanded, though, is not a feeling. It is an attitude that can be chosen. But since it is easier to act upon our feelings than upon our attitudes, King wrote helpfully about the necessity of having the strength to love.

Just as physical strength increases by exercising, the strength to love increases by practicing it.

Othering and "One Anothering"

This article is partly the lament of an old white guy. It was sparked by a Thinking Friend telling me in an email that she had been advised to "give up on old white guys."

The Problem: Othering

My thinking on this subject was also stirred by Cierra Lockett writing about how some African-Americans have a problem feeling bicultural because “though they're American citizens, it's hard to feel American because of how the country historically and currently oppresses and ‘others’ them.”

That, without a doubt, is far, far worse than the othering I have experienced. But it is a difference of degree, not of kind. While in the U.S. it is much worst for African-Americans and American Indians, every group—or individual—who suffers from prejudice is a victim of being “othered.”

It is not hard to see why old white guys are the target of criticism—and of being othered. Perhaps most of the problems of the world are the results of the “sins” of old white guys.

But prejudice is thinking that all the people of a group partake of the characteristics of the problematic people of that group. Thus, I am saddened when “written off” because of the mistakes of so many old white guys, past and present.

For example, I have been disappointed that few youngish people read and comment on my blog articles. I have tried to get people below 30 or even 40 to read and comment. Few have—for a variety of reasons, no doubt. Perhaps one main reason, though, is because most think that an old guy doesn’t have anything of value to say to them.

Last month I was criticized for suggesting that becoming/being bicultural might be something beneficial for African-Americans to consider. I was told by several people that whites shouldn’t make any suggestions to blacks.

There is also the problem of us guys saying anything substantial about matters relating to women: the charge of “mansplaining” has become rather common.

So, whether intended or not, “old white guys” are sometimes (often?) othered by those who are young, by people of color, and by women. Perhaps such othering serves us right—but, still, it is a cause of sadness. 

The Solution: One Anothering

Is there no way we all can relate to one another simply as human beings?

The Bible says “Love one another.” That surely doesn’t mean we are to love only people like us—for the old to love the elderly, whites to love whites, and males to love males. (And, of course, I am talking about agape-love here, not erotic love.)

To love one another surely means to accept/respect everyone without prejudice regardless of age, ethnic, or gender differences. Is that kind of mutual love/acceptance/respect too much to expect?

Back in 1990 Richard C. Meyer, a Presbyterian pastor in Florida, wrote a book titled One Anothering. The book was mainly written for small groups, but the title has an important broader meaning.  

Those of us in a position of privilege, though, have the main responsibility to take the initiative and to reach out in love to those who have been othered most severely.

South American liberation theology has often spoken about the “preferential option for the poor.” It is perhaps time for most of us, especially us old white guys, to promote a preferential option for those individuals/groups who are suffering most because of being othered.

That kind of one anothering means actively loving whether we are reciprocally loved or not. 

Unarmed Truth and Unconditional Love

The year 1964 was a difficult one for the United States. The nation had suffered the assassination of a beloved President in November of the year before.

The war in Vietnam was heating up in 1964: the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which escalated the U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia, was passed by Congress in August. By the end of the year, more than 23,000 U.S. troops were there.

Public protest against the war also began that year Joan Baez led six hundred people in an antiwar demonstration in December. It was also the time of great racial tension across the nation, especially in Alabama and Mississippi.

On December 10, 1964, Martin Luther King, Jr., whose actual birthday is today, gave his acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize which he had been awarded—and at that time he was the youngest person ever to receive that prestigious prize.

As was true for many of his public talks, King’s address on that December day in Oslo, Norway, was a powerful one. Despite all the negative things going on in the world and in the U.S., King was positive and hopeful about the future.

In that memorable speech, King said,

I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. I believe that even amid today’s mortar bursts and whining bullets, there is still hope for a brighter tomorrow. I believe that wounded justice, lying prostrate on the blood-flowing streets of our nations, can be lifted from this dust of shame to reign supreme among the children of men. I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits.

President Obama’s seventh, and last, State of the Union address was delivered on Tuesday of last week. It is noteworthy that in his speech, the President referred to King and quoted his words about “unarmed truth and unconditional love.”

Then at the very end of his hour-long talk, the President emphasized that he was “optimistic that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.”

I am not sure what all King, or the President, had in mind by uttering those words. But at the very least it is an expression of hope that truth is more powerful than falsehood and that love is more powerful than hate—in spite of what might seem to be the case at times.

That same confidence in the future was expressed by Theodore Parker (1810-60) in words that both King and Obama have quoted, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”

There is a lot of negativity in our country now, and that “gloom and doom” is being stoked by the politicians running for the White House this year. Because of 24-hour cable news, people constantly see and hear about the bad things that are happening.

Almost three-fourths of the general public in the U.S. is dissatisfied with the way things are going in the country.

Given the mood of the nation and all the criticism constantly heaped upon him and his presidency, it is remarkable that the President was able to be so upbeat in his SOTU message.

And in spite of all the negativity, it is heartening that just as King did in his 1964 speech, President Obama was able to emphasize that, indeed, unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.

Is Becoming Inclusive Even Remotely Possible?

After posting my previous blog article, I expected to hear from one or more people saying that the idea of doing away with us/them divisions was fuzzy idealism and not at all possible.

Alas, no one made such comments, so I have to do it myself! How can we possibly become completely inclusive in October, the peak of the baseball season? Right now it is us (Go Royals!) against them (the Blue Jays, which is not even a U.S. team, for Pete’s sake).

Competitive sports is based on a strong us/them dichotomy. True, there is a type of volleyball in which rotation occurs from one side to the other. While that can still be fun to play, I’m afraid it is never going to be included in the Olympic Games.

Several days ago I saw the following image on Facebook:

This is a nice thought—but, no, I can’t really imagine it. There is so little love and respect for so many people even in our own neighborhoods and cities I, can’t imagine most of us are going to be able in any meaningful way to love and respect the more than 7,000,000,000 people in the world.

Here in Tucson where June and I are visiting for several weeks, there are “We Stand with Rosa” signs in many yards I have driven past, including in the yard next to my daughter’s place (pictured).

Rosa Robles is a 41 year old Mexican woman who was originally detained in 2010 after a routine traffic stop revealed she was in the country illegally. In August 2014 she moved into a Presbyterian church here in Tucson for sanctuary after receiving an order of deportation.

Rosa said she came to the U.S. in 1999 to give her kids a better life. They were born in Mexico, but qualify for relief by the President’s executive action. She admits that she did break the law by entering the country illegally—but thinks those with families and clean records should be spared deportation.

Those who are standing with Rosa in Tucson are loving and respecting her and her family. But Rosa is just one out of millions of “illegals” in this country—and many voices cry out for “them” to be deported—and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency is trying to do its job by deporting Rosa.

There is widespread clamor for securing the borders—not just against terrorists and criminals, but against all who seek to come into this country without going through the lengthy, and expensive, legal immigration process.

In a world where there is only “us” and no “thems,” there would be no borders, national or otherwise. But, sadly, that is not possible in today’s world. Most of the people in this country would fight rather than have completely open borders.

But what if we all loved and respected each another, if we loved others as we love ourselves, if we practiced the Golden Rule?

In his Civilization and Its Discontents (1930) Freud wrote that the commandment “Love thy neighbour as thyself is impossible to fulfill.” He is probably correct.

Writing five years later in Interpretation of Christian Ethics, Reinhold Niebuhr cites Freud’s words in “The Relevance of an Impossible Ethical Ideal,” the fourth chapter. Then he goes on to insist that “the law of love is an impossible possibility.”

Yes, becoming completely inclusive is, no doubt, not even remotely possible. But becoming more and more inclusive is a real possibility—and a constant challenge for all who seek to follow the teachings of Jesus Christ.