good intentions & greed
A wise saying, attributed to anonymous, rephrased:
There are very few people who intentionally do evil; most people believe in their good intentions.
I don’t think Hitler thought he was doing something evil. I don’t think Pullman thought he was being authoritarian. I don’t think ISIS thinks that they are morally reprehensible. This is the crazy thing about defining good for ourselves – without a moral standard, everything is good.
Yet the moment that we think, we are the only ones who understand and that our decisions, however harsh, are for the best of the other – we have made ourselves God. Or a parent.
We have defined good for the good of others but all we’re really doing is practicing greed.
Greed to pad our own pockets. Greed to fill our emotions with feeling right. Greed to consume the energy, thoughts, and life of another for our own purposes.
Let us not be so obsessed with perfection to discard the messy world that God saw and said was good.