Guiding Light: Global Powers Stockpile Weapons While The World Cries For Peace
It’s a fact that the majority of religious scriptures and their preceptors have preached that non-violence is the supreme religion. Therefore, it can be inferred that violence in any form is the greatest of all evils. It has many faces, like anger, hatred and cruelty, but taking someone's life is considered to be the highest degree of violence.
Going a step ahead, killing those who are innocent and have no contribution to making the situation come to the edge is an even greater crime. And the supreme of all forms of cruelties is the en masse killing of innocent civilians. We read and watch about mass killings all the time in the news and in history books coloured with tales of bloodshed.
Of late, we have been hearing and watching about aerial bombings of one country by another, reading about mass extermination of one community by the head of another, and so on. And despite such gruesome episodes to learn from, humans are not ready to budge.
That is why terrorist attacks, suicide bombings and wars continue to threaten life everywhere today, and preparations for more and fiercer mass murders continue to be made. This is described in our scriptures as a time when there is a dance of death all around. Such an event of mass murders points to the utmost degradation of the human spirit.
When humans are unable to connect to others of their kind as their own, it results in the loss of their most essential element—humanity. The conscience is so much torn in strife and so much taken over by ego, rage and greed that it becomes numb to the cries of fellow human beings. Under such a situation, values like mercy and forgiveness are given up to justify political logic.
With the existing stock of nuclear weapons created by various nations, we have already made preparations to blow up the earth more than thirty times over. And still unsatisfied, many more of such means of destruction are being researched, refined and stockpiled around the world under the ironical pretext of providing security.
Hence, it can be said that the present period of lull and peace, with simultaneous preparation for war between major nuclear nations, is merely postponing an even greater manmade disaster. Yet, even in the shadow of this looming peril, the flicker of hope remains, if only we choose to nurture it.
If we can reignite empathy, reawaken compassion, and rekindle the lost connection with our shared humanity, we might still turn the tide. The question is: will we awaken before the final curtain falls?
(nikunjji@gmail.com --- www.brahmakumaris.com)
Writer is a spiritual educator & popular columnist for publications across India, Nepal & UK. To date 8500+ published columns have been written by him.
news