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For more than 5000 years, humankind has rendered one another worthless, helpless or hopeless in the name of protecting the rights and views of a few. Great wars and atrocities have been the watchwords of the victorious as well as the vanquished. Behold the coming of a new awareness to replace the precarious trust that victimized thinking affords. For we are a World, and perhaps a Universe, of living beings needing to depend on one another for our continued existence.
Our long history of devastating afflictions, suffocating intolerance and demoralizing indifference dare not repeat itself, for there will be a time when turning back will be impossible. Even now, the faint of heart and the rigid of mind flail about in chaotic frenzy, feeding on the promises of those who perpetuate selfish pursuit as the pathway to happiness. Human comfort has replaced human compassion, just as human achievement has replaced human accord. It is time for us to set forth on a new journey, with new expectations. It is time for us to recognize the benefits of learning how to truly serve one another, and that those benefits cannot be derived without a major change in thinking.
It begins with those who believe they see the light, yet walk in darkness as they blind one another with their own guarded definitions of the light others should see. It begins with those who believe they are victims, yet walk in the shadows of their own sorrowful or enraged reflections. It begins with those who stalk and defile those they fear or hate. It begins with those who try to walk taller than others, thinking they need to protect, control or dominate those who cannot. It begins with those who believe they should defeat and eliminate those who rise up against them. It begins with each member of the human race.
We begin anew with the recognition that we of this World are indeed human beings living in coexistence with other living beings. It concedes that our higher intellectual capacities are both the problem and the solution. For the minds of men and women of this beautiful Planet do not always harbour beautiful thoughts and feelings. We are presently cursed with the national, cultural, religious and familial inheritance born of and passed down from the aforementioned history of affliction. We are also cursed with the memories of afflictions that have happened to us or loved ones during our own lifetime. It is this mind-centered remembrance that so often gives rise to affliction in the first place, as suspicion, fear, anger or hatred constructs our interpretations of others. Hence, it is our own minds that we must question, rather than the minds of others. For the glory of the future will start when a common vision, the restoration of hope, and a sense of worthiness spreads across all populations of Planet Earth.
This declaration is a "Call to Arms", not those of war and violence, but those that embrace one another in the peaceful pursuit of dignity and respect for all who share the precious air that we breathe. For as we embrace one another, we will be able to collaborate and resolve the naturally evolving issues, instead of wasting our time and energy on the problems we are creating for ourselves. We are on this Earth together, and we will arrive together in time to either live, leave or die -- this will be our collective choice -- and it begins now, profoundly with each person's own, personal choice.
A word about God is essential to our moment. So many of the World's afflictions have been and are being fought over differences about the existence, definition and role of God or Spirit. This Declaration of Interdependence excludes no one, for we all depend on the choices and actions of others who populate this Earth, and possibly beyond. Perhaps as we embrace one another with dignity and respect, and bring to a close our historical methods of intolerance and greed, we will find a "Union of the Heart" where minds have failed, and bring to humankind the realities of Faith and Love without discrimination and conflict over religious doctrine. It is with this hope that this is written.
So let us declare loud and clear, that our Worldly Mission is to find our rightful and peaceful interdependence. And, perhaps this means we need to revisit and redefine the tenets of independence and freedom. It has been written that there is no freedom without responsibility, and no independence without freedom. We must learn that these two great cornerstones of modern civilization, freedom and independence, depend entirely on how we treat one another. Upon this the future depends.
Written September 21, 2001 N. Lewis Noggle
Copyright Spiritual Journey 2007