I recently finished James Carroll’s book, Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews, and it seems to unfortunately relate as much to our times today as the times focused on in The Mischlinge Exposé in regards to a polarized, fundamentalist society. Here are some quotes that stood out while reading:
“Hatred of the other became society’s scare-driven urge to eradicate an alien part of itself.”
“...moved against doubt in the traditional way - by repressing existential anxiety, defining it as evil, and projecting it...”
“Universalist absolutism thrives on the diminishment of the other.”
“Homo sapiens is the species that invents symbols in which to invest passion and authority, then forgets that symbols are inventions.”
“The nature of truth required modesty toward oneself and respect toward all others.”
“Difference is to be respected, not condemned.”
“We understand one another, if at all, only through analogies. Each recognizes that any attempt to reduce the authentic otherness of another’s focus to one’s own with our common habits of domination only seems to destroy us all, only increases the leveling power of the all-too-common denominators making no one at home. Conflict is our actuality. Conversation is our hope.”
“When the problem is defined as belonging to the victim group, the “solution“ becomes that groups removal.”