All You Need is Love, Love

I guess I'm harping a lot lately about the issue of love and tolerance, but I suppose that I've been thinking about it so much because I've seen such a lack of it in the world lately. My mind wraps around the voice of the President of Iran saying that he wants to wipe Israel off the face of the map. I have a friend who is Iranian. When I was pregnant with my daughter he gave me a St. Michael medallion, Michael being a guardian angel who fights evil. I wore it the whole time I was pregnant, believing in it's good energy and appreciating the kindness of the friend who gave it to me. Over dinner once he commented about how funny it was that an Iranian and a Jewish woman could have a peaceful dinner amongst friends at the same table, while across the ocean Iranians and Jews are fighting. It's very sad; we're all people at the end of the day, with families we love and who love us, with friends and dreams and the need to eat and sleep. Most of us aren't evil, although some people are. Right now I am doing a painting for St. Francis mission; it's a painting they asked me to do and it has a Christian theme. I am enjoying the creative process behind getting it done and using all my good energy to create a beautiful rendition of the cross the painting is based upon. I was born Catholic (Irish Catholic, to be exact) and so I do feel a tie to Catholism and love Catholic art. I can go to church with my husband and dig a lot of what is being said, even if my own beliefs run counter to some of it. Alternatively, my husband sometimes goes to synagogue with me and says the same thing; he doesn't feel threatened by people who follow a different faith from his own. Maybe growing up in the absence of any organized religion gave me a different perspective. My parents didn't raised us with a little of Christianity and Judaism because they didn't want to "pick a side" when it came to their families and most of what I learned about God I learned through my own endeavors. I grew up reading about Mary, watching the Pope on television, and also attending Seders and bar/bat mitzvahs as well as various holidays in the synagogue. I grew up with a sense of there being a loving God who different people called by different names. I look at my daughter and she is so innocent. She knows nothing of racial prejudice, anti-semitism, religious persecution, or war. I wish that none of had to know of these things. I suppose that the only good created by these things is that each of us has the opportunity to spread love through our refusal to honor them. The real gift is our ability to choose and to take right actions, and I think all of the world's major religions teach us that love should always be the side on which we err.