Our tolerance for forms of religious expression we disagree with is a precise barometer of our own spiritual security.
Interpretation
The way we handle differing religious beliefs reflects our own spiritual confidence.
This quote suggests that the extent to which we can accept and tolerate religious expressions that differ from our own is an indicator of how secure and confident we feel in our own beliefs. When someone is spiritually secure, they are less likely to feel threatened by opposing views and can appreciate the diversity of thought in religious expression.
In practice
During a panel discussion on interfaith relationships, this quote could be used to highlight the importance of acceptance.
...the goal of all spiritual life is to get your ego out of the way - outwit the sucker; dissolve it; shoot it; kill it. Silence the incessant planning, organizing, running, manipulating, possessing, and processing"... "because these activities preclude awareness of the Divine.
Yes, now I understood for the first time that my soul was not so poor and empty as it had seemed to me, and that it had been only the sun that was lacking to open all its germs, and buds to the light.
For a time Jack was angry; but when he had been without the jacket for a short while he began to realize that being half-clothed is infinitely more uncomfortable than being entirely naked. Soon he did not miss his clothing in the least, and from that he came to revel in the freedom of his unhampered state.
When I talk about democratic socialist, I am talking about Medicare, a single payer health care system for the elderly. And in my view, we should expand that concept to all people. I believe that everybody in this country should be entitled to health care as a right.
We are not utopians, we do not βdreamβ of dispensing at once with all administration, with all subordination. These anarchist dreams, based upon incomprehension of the tasks of the proletarian dictatorship, are totally alien to Marxism, and, as a matter of fact, serve only to postpone the socialist revolution until people are different. No, we want the socialist revolution with people as they are now, with people who cannot dispense with subordination, control, and "foremen and accountants".
For a long time the human instinct to understand was thwarted by facile religious explanations.
Strong and healthy, who thinks of sickness until it strikes like lightning? Preoccupied with the world, who thinks of death, until it arrives like thunder?
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.