Pride

We have come a short way.

We used to hear a lot about a group “coming a long way.”  It was said about Blacks, about Women, about the Irish, about Jews, about LGBT people.  Noting that this month celebrates “Pride,” and is ever larger as an event in more and more cities across the world, one is tempted to repeat the old phrase. 

Shouldn’t it really be, though, not “you have come a long way,” but “we have come a short way?”  We, meaning society as a whole.  We, meaning what is taught and learned about justice and human rights in our homes, churches and schools.  We, meaning taking a step or two closer to a community of shared values, with the desire to understand, embrace and heal.   

The path from tolerance to acceptance to embracing “the other,” is the path of civilization itself.  It is a long journey for all societies, without an “arrival.” When we enjoy the company of those whose lives have diverged from ours, who have been held “outside the gates,” or settled into Ghettos, we experience less the satisfaction of moral purpose, than the benefits of a swelling unity of action.  Together we are invincible as a force for global well-being.  When we bring our separate experiences and ideas to the common table, we reach farther and more humanely into the future. 

Make no mistake.  In our present world it may be harder for each of us to enter this salvific future than for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.  But what is life without faith, and what is faith without true sister and brotherhood.  And that will be our Pride!