“Have a good day!” is a common salutation once offered at the end of a conversation.
A more recent one has become “Have a good day–don’t listen to the news!”… as it always leads and is bombarded with bad, horrifying and depressing events–repeated day after day, after day…
When you consider the media as the circulatory system of society, just as veins and arteries serve as the circulatory system of the human body, consider perpetually pumping poison through each! The inevitable result is sickness and detriment! Couple this with prime-time television programming-–either predominantly criminal, billed as “positively entertaining,” sex or stupidity oriented–and you reap a sick, demented society. The steadily increasing number of religious organizations that continue to form, rather than stem the negative tide, appear instead to do more to divide than unite the masses.
As one must “think high to rise,” so must we think, act and re-act cooperatively rather than competitively to accomplish fullest potential as individuals, a family, community, nation or world family. It doesn’t begin at the top and trickle down. The dire need for social reform cannot be legislated. It must rise from the bottom up. Peace must become part of a curriculum. In some countries (including our own), children drill with mock guns and rifles as part of play or as sports. This must be countered with universal education aimed at the development of humanity’s peaceful side.
To reduce the many prejudices that easily pit one faction against another is to reduce warring mentality–historically used to trigger war on any level. It’s hard to respect spending multi-$billions to correct the injustices that exist in other nations around the world while unable to serve as a shining example at home. With the advent of social media, it seems the same urgent and controversial social problems continue to grab the headlines, only more quickly.
From beginning to end of his life man passes through certain periods or stages, each of which is marked by certain conditions peculiar to itself. For instance during the period of childhood his conditions and requirements are characteristic of that degree of intelligence and capacity. Upon entering the period of youth his former conditions and needs are superseded by new requirements applicable to his advance in degree. His passing into the stage of maturity necessitates another transformation and corresponding advance in his sphere of life-activity with special bounties and bestowal, in proportion to his increased capacities, that his former period of youth and its conditions no longer satisfy.
Similarly are the periods and stages in the life of the aggregate world of humanity, now entering its long presaged period of maturity, the evidences of which are everywhere visible and apparent. Therefore the requirements and conditions of former stages are not compatible.
Imperative at this stage of mankind’s maturity is discussion, promotion and practice of social issues with world vision and spiritual perspective. Baha’is believe the remedy for ailments afflicting mankind, commensurate to this early stage of maturity, are best addressed through the most recent Revelation of Baha’u’llah, now in its embryonic stages of “laying the foundation of divine reality upon which material and spiritual civilization will be founded throughout future centuries!” (Investigate!–let the reader understand)
