Dazzled by Good

"... what good is; negative will --- no, I don't like that. I like blindness towards evil to come from being dazzled by good; otherwise virtue is ignorance --- poverty." --- Andre Gide Prometheus Misbound.

The examples of the saints from every religion choosing the good over evil is almost incomprehensible when I consider the evil these great souls have faced. Whether it is the monks of Myanmar standing in front of unimaginable oppression by the military regime there, the ugliness of racism confronted by Martin Luther King or it is the simple act of Mother Teresa working close with the outcasts of India, I am humbled.

Good is the candle lit in darkness. The more the darkness, the less it takes to give light to the room. The courage towards good is what is so astounding. That courage has to come from a place that is accessed from a source so profound it cannot be understood using ordinary terms. Societies are set up so that the worst instincts of human kind are exploited and controlled. That is what the rule of law is. When Christ proposed that we live by the Golden Rule instead, he set in motion a revolution that still bears fruit today.

The courage to be dazzled by good, in lieu of being intimidated by evil, is found in the simple acts of compassion... I.e., one hand helping another.