LISTP@WABASH (01/17/90)
First off,
I want to thank several people at once for their helpful replies to my
initial post about "the call". In the rush of the last few days, I've lost the
messages and forgotten the names, but I didn't want them to go unthanked.
Now, the main point of this message is to bring up what may be a
sensative issue: is all this talk about "symbols", "in God we trust", etc.
necessary? After reading several dozzen posts on the topics, it seems to me
that issues like these (and there are others, such as homosexulity, infant
baptism, etc.) just take people round and round in circles, inflame emotions,
and use up a lot of space in peoples' accounts. On the symbols, for example,
those people who think (as I do) that a symbol is good or evil according to how
YOU YOURSELF use it and think of it are not likely to ever change their
opinion. Likewise, those who do place a great deal of significance upon the
history of a symbol show no signs of altering their opinions. Fine, there is
nothing inherantly bad about this situation. Though I hold the first beleif,
I'm not about to say that those who hold the second are wrong, they are just
different. I'm not even saying we should agree to disagree, I'm just
suggesting we bow to the obvious- that people hold different opinions, and
sometimes these opinions are held very intensely- and not belabor the point.
I want to make clear- I am not censuring anyone, nor am I suggesting
that all discussion on those topics be cut off. SOME discussion does good,
but running things into the ground just wastes time and tends to lead not to
enlightenment, but to flaming.
With that, I will end this. I've spent too much time dealing with
Christia mail and writing this message as it is; more time than either is worth
in all likelyhood.
pETER a. lIST