Tuesday, January 16, 2007

We Have Not Learned

We have not learned
To live together

We have not learned
To listen together
To speak together
To disagree together
To share together
To invite one another
To work together
To love one another.

All else is empty theory:

We shoot each other down
We have built walls of silence:
Our own, and enforced
We define ourselves
by who we are not

If we cannot live into ecumenism
in our own classroom
in our own hotel
in our own
small community
with our own hands
and ears and mouths

We gain nothing.

(Written in Geneva, reflecting on the ELCA-sponsored course: 'the Ecumenical Church in the Globalized World')

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