Beech Tree News Network

Hate is a big mouth, and I’m just about tired of the vitriol he’s been spewing.  This year, Hate invaded Ukraine.  He shot up schools and gay night clubs and children’s birthday parties.  He killed a young woman in Iran for not honoring a dress code.  Hate singled out Hispanic and Chinese people, and for good measure, dumped a truckload of anti Semitism onto the Jewish community.

Hate goes after what he doesn’t understand.  He is threatened by different.  He is afraid and jealous and exclusive.  Hate believes he has the market cornered on the truth.  He does not.  That honor belongs to Kindness and her children, Understanding and Courage.  

Hate always takes the easy way.  He believes might is right.  He discounts the ideas and ideals of the wise.  He mocks the feelings of the gentle and the meek.  Hate is only interested in what he has to say, and he deserts all those who are not in agreement with him.  For those who are in agreement with him, he goes to great lengths to make them feel powerful.  It is just a ruse.  The power does not belong to them.  The words they speak belong to Hate.  He is the great ventriloquist.  

Hate makes sure his name is front and center on every news channel, at the top of every hour, on every day of the week.  Hate uses this ploy to make sure all eyes are on him.  This ploy snuffs out the hope of the unaware.  It fills them with dread and makes them feel it is of no use to try to do good.

This is a lie, of course. 

“Bad news breaks suddenly, but good news is happening everywhere, all the time.”  A correspondent on CBS Sunday Morning said that.  He’s right.  Think about your life in this country.  I mean right now, right where you live.  You have problems, sure.  We all do, but for most of us, the world isn’t falling down around us.  If there are people in our lives who need help, we help them.  If we can’t help them personally, we find someone who can.

I’m not suggesting we close our eyes to the hurt and suffering going on in the world.  I’m just saying that we are of no use if that’s all we focus on.  If we live in dread and believe everything is going to Hell in a handbasket, we’ll be responsible for sending it all to Hell in a handbasket. 

We are coming upon a new year.  You know what?  I don’t care what news channel you watch.  I also don’t care which church you go to.  You are not my enemy.  You are not my adversary.  

“We are all just hunks of dust.  I can’t understand why one hunk of dust can’t get along with another hunk of dust.”  A minister friend of mine said that.  That pretty much sums it up.

Happy New Year!  It’s time to kick Hate to the curb!