Wisdom born of experience should tell us that war is obsolete.
If we are to have peace on Earth, our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. No individual can live alone, no nation can live alone—and as long as we try, the more we are going to have war in this world. The judgment of God is upon us, and we must either learn to live together as brothers or we’re all going to perish together as fools. Yes, as nations and individuals we are interdependent.
All life is interrelated. We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. We are made to live together because of the interrelated structure of reality.
Did you ever stop to think that you can’t leave for your job in the morning without being dependent on most of the world? You get up in the morning and go to the bathroom and reach over for a sponge, and that’s handed to you by a Pacific Islander. You reach for a bar of soap, and that’s given to you at the hands of a Frenchman. And then you go in the kitchen to drink your coffee for the morning, and that’s poured in your cup by a South American. Or maybe you want tea: that’s poured in your cup by a Chinese. Or maybe you’re desirous of having cocoa for breakfast, and that’s poured in your cup by a West African. And then you reach over for your toast, and that’s given to you at the hands of an English-speaking farmer—not to mention the baker! And before you finish eating breakfast in the morning you are dependent on more than half of the world. This is the way our universe is structured. It is its interrelated quality. We aren’t going to have peace on Earth until we recognize this basic fact of the interrelated structure of all reality.
We will never have peace in the world until men everywhere recognize that ends are not cut off from means. Because the means represent the ideal in the making, and the end in process. And ultimately, you can’t reach good ends through evil means because the means represent the seed and the end represents the tree.
