With all the rhetoric of late across this great nation of
ours, I’m amazed at how we’ve transformed ourselves from a voice of grace and
dignity to a tone of disrespect and insult.
Grace is defined in numerous ways:
“Simple elegance or refinement of movement”
“The free and unmerited favor of God”
“Disposition to or an act or instance of kindness”
What troubles me is that lately I haven’t seen much grace in
alignment with these definitions. What I
see instead is just the opposite.
Antonyms of Grace include:
“Interference”
“Crudeness”
“Flaw”
Recent Facebook posts, tweets, and conversation go something
like this:
“Our political system
is defective.”
“There are too many
obstacles to overcome because of the failure of others.”
“She’s inferior and
ignorant. She doesn’t belong there!”
What if we were to embrace the way we communicate to and about
others with grace and dignity vice put-downs and insults? What if our conversations across social media and face-to-face
reflected something similar to the following:
“I may not agree with
his stance, but I respect that he’s entitled to his opinion on the matter.”
“I appreciate that
despite her struggle to answer the question, she did her best to remain
composed during the heated debate.”
“Sure, we have
problems, but collectively we have enough compassion for one another to
overcome anything!”
Wouldn’t the world be a better place if we took a more
graceful approach to our discussions?
Think about the possibilities if as one nation, one world, we chose to
embrace differences as opposed to ridiculing what we don’t agree with.
Let’s give grace a try, shall we?
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