11.14.2015

grieving for paris, grieving for beirut, grieving for the world

In thinking about the attacks in Paris and Beirut yesterday, two of my favorite quotes come to mind. I'm wishing that more of us could think beyond ourselves, beyond our petty resentments, beyond our fear of other, beyond our greed and lust for power over others, which kindles hatred, aggression, war, massacre and genocide.

I'm grieving for you, Paris and Beirut, and for so many others living in fear and subject to oppression, injustice, exploitation and hardship and murder, even within our own borders.

Alex Churney, A Milky Way Shadow at Loch Ard Gorge
How vast those Orbs must be, and how inconsiderable this Earth, the Theatre upon which all our mighty Designs, all our Navigations, and all our Wars are transacted, is when compared to them. A very fit consideration, and matter of Reflection, for those Kings and Princes who sacrifice the Lives of so many People, only to flatter their Ambition in being Masters of some pitiful corner of this small Spot.

—Christiaan Huygens, The Immense Distance Between the Sun and the Planets, 1698

People light candles in front of the French consulate in Montreal. Photo: AP
When you're finally up at the moon looking back on earth, all those differences and nationalistic traits are pretty well going to blend, and you're going to get a concept that maybe this really is one world and why the hell can't we learn to live together like decent people.

—Frank Borman, Apollo 8, December 1968

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