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Silent Knowledge
David French, an influential Christian conservative writer and First Amendment lawyer, said…“the root of all this extremism is a kind of cultural panic inside conservative political and religious views.” The panic arises from a sense that the culture wars have been “irretrievably lost,” leading many in the right wing to conclude that they must now “exercise raw political power.” What makes it all worse, he stated, is a sense of emergency arising from a “hyped sense of impending Armageddon” being the essence of the story now being told on the right.
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….He was looking down when suddenly his face lit up with wonder. He had just discovered something on the ground and picked it up. Mara’s attendants asked what the meditator had found that lit him up. Mara stated that it was a piece of truth. “Oh, evil one,” the attendants asked, doesn’t this upset you when someone finds a piece of truth?” “Not at all,” replied Mara, “for right after finding a bit of truth, they usually make a belief out of it.”
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Those who proclaim to the outside world that they have found the one and only way to see things are usually hiding a deep division within themselves. Fundamentalist attitudes grow where one part of a person becomes devoted to the letter and rule of the law, while the other side judges and castigates whoever acts or believes in a different way. How…
