As we are opening the sanctuary on the 28th of June for Sunday Services, this format will change back to announcements of the week’s Special Speaker; so this will be the last, in this venue, of my mini-presentations addressing Spirituality from a Divine Science perspective.
As it appears the Covid-19 crisis has burst open society’s Pandora’s Box, flinging our most consequential immoralities onto Main Street, onto all Media outlets, and into our intimate circles of family and friends where they demand to be attended.
To this end, I am sharing my personal experience in dealing with the “other”, one of our nation’s early and long-nurtured offenses. I was raised in a small town in Brown County, Kansas, where many years earlier African American families found refuge when driven from their homes in other Northeastern Kansas communities. Now as an adult, I feel confident there were racist attitudes in that farming community; however, it was not obvious to me then or now.
The banker and our black bootlegger lived on the same street (Parts of Kansas are still dry.). It was side-by-side seating on the stools in the local café. Everyone shopped in the same grocery store. All the county’s kids attended the same schools and often had outstanding basketball players and at least one, during my four years of high school, black cheerleader. Everyone banked at the Farmer State Bank. The whole community attended the summer movies in the park. When I am back in my hometown on family visits, I spend an afternoon with my good high school friend, who with her husband has retired there after having lived around the world. She is a proud, beautiful, and accomplished Black Woman.
I am not naïve; I am sure her story of our childhood would be different, but my attitudes and my actions are motivated by my experiences. As a graduating senior, my father’s company moved us to Colorado. Where my social experience was broadened by the long-time multicultural communities of Pueblo’s diverse population. My sons attended Central High School, where at that time the student board was as diverse as the community. My family although slight in numbers is delightfully, lovingly diverse with African American and Chinese American grandchildren.
This is my story, not necessarily planned, simply evolving as circumstances developed; however, since I was never unduly influenced by my elders or others, I was allowed to interact with people on an individual basis, based on who and what she or he was/is and how they behaved to me. So the tenet of New Thought philosophies that we are ONE with Divine Mind and therefore with each other has never been a hurdle.
There is no footnote, no except, to the “Golden Rule”, ‘Doing unto others, as you would be done unto’ is found in Leviticus 19:8. It is the “ethic of reciprocity, a moral maxim. It is found in the spiritual works of hundreds of cultures and multiple languages. Consequently, the current rush to explain and affirm different sections of our society should be unnecessary. However, this is apparently not so. The place to start, it would seem to me is to practice the Good Manners, Common Courtesy, and Common Sense. To be as respectful of my neighbor as I would like her or him to be to me.