We must content ourselves with the mystery, the absurdity, the contradictions, the hostility, but also the generosity that our environment offers us. It's not much, but it's always better than the deadly, defeatist certainty of the paranoid.

This love meditation is adapted from the Visuddhimagga by Buddhaghosa, a 5th century C.E. systematization of the Buddha's teaching. We begin by practicing the love meditation on ourselves (May I). Until we are able to love and take care of ourselves, we cannot be much help to others. After that, we practice them on others (May he/she/they) - first on someone we like, then on someone neutral to us, and finally on someone who makes us suffer. May I be peaceful, happy, and light in body and spirit.May I be safe and free from injury.May I be free from anger, afflictions, fear and anxiety.May I learn to look at myself with the eyes of of understanding and love.May I be able to recognize and touch the seeds of joy and happiness in myself.May I learn to identify and see the sources of anger, craving, and delusion in myself.May I know how to nourish the seeds of joy in myself every day.May I be able to live fresh, solid, and free.May I be free from attachment and aversion, but not indifferent.Love is not just the intention to love, but the capacity to reduce suffering, and offer peace and happiness. The practice of love increases our forbearance, our capacity to be patient and embrace difficulties and pain. Forbearance does mean that we try to suppress pain.

Ignorance is in each cell of our body and our consciousness. It's like a drop of ink diffused in a glass of water.

Time was when much of lawyering consisted (according to turn-of-the-century lawyer and statesman Elihu Root) in telling would-be clients that they are damned fool's, and should stop.

The religious scholars I have consulted are passionate about the need for political leaders to educate themselves in the varieties of faith and to see religion more as a potential means for reconciliation than as a source of conflict.