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Quote by Michael Marcel, Sr.

“There appears to be an errant gene in the human genome that prevents harmony, peace, and long-term solutions. We will end, like so many civilizations we discover in the dust of history, the dust for a future civilization to discover. Future books will describe how our time was marked by moments of progress and brilliance, it is also marred by self-made conflicts and struggles. We failed on our watch. How is it that we are a species that can view the early beginnings of the universe, build satellites, go to the moon, and explore Mars and our distant planets, and yet we cannot learn to live together in peace?”

Quote by Michael Marcel, Sr.

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Michael Marcel, Sr.

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“Peace on earth.” “Goodwill toward men.” “Tidings of comfort and joy.” Are these things not the very embodiment of our deepest desires and most vigorous passions? Are these not that which we yearn for? And yet, despite the fact that we thirst for them with a longing indescribable, we are left with the wretched reality that we have been unable to achieve them. Yet, that is the reason and rationale for Christmas itself. For such passions might elude our ability to weave these things firmly into the tapestry our existence. Yet God came on Christmas so that they might become our existence.”

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Author:Craig D. Lounsbrough
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“We live in a time I did not think I would see in my lifetime, a time when freedom—and in particular freedom of expression, without which the world of books could not exist—is everywhere under attack from reactionary, authoritarian, populist, demagogic, narcissistic, careless voices; when places of education and libraries are subject to hostility and censorship; and when extremist religion and bigoted ideologies have begun to intrude in areas of life in which they do not belong. And there are also progressive voices being raised in favor of a new kind of bien-pensant censorship, one which appears virtuous, and which many people have begun to see as a virtue. So freedom is under pressure from the left as well as the right, the young as well as the old. This is something new, and made more complicated by our new tool of communication, the Internet, on which well-designed pages of malevolent lies sit side by side with the truth, and it is difficult for many people to tell which is which; and our social media, where the idea of freedom is every day abused to permit, very often, a kind of online mob rule, which the billionaire owners of these platforms seem increasingly willing to encourage—and to profit by. What do we do about free speech when it is so widely abused? We should still do, with renewed vigor, what we have always needed to do: to answer bad speech with better speech, to counter false narratives with better narratives, to answer hate with love, and to believe that the truth can still succeed even in an age of lies. We must defend it fiercely and define it as broadly as possible, so, yes, we should of course defend speech that offends us; otherwise we are not defending free expression at all. Let a thousand and one voices speak in a thousand and one different ways. To quote Cavafy, “the barbarians are coming today,” and what I do know is that the answer to philistinism is art, the answer to barbarianism is civilization, and in any war it may be that artists of all sorts—filmmakers, actors, singers, and, yes, those who practice the ancient art of the book—can still, together, turn the barbarians away from the gates.”

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Author:Salman Rushdie
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“The peace of men is nothing than a hesitant and brittle calm under which burns coals constantly stoked and ever-stirred by agitated and self-serving men. And this ease which we call ‘peace’ is destined to erupt in flames that call men of peace to the perilous task of extinguishing those flames yet again. Yet the nature of mankind is such that the coals remain and the stoking and stirring continue. For the Prince of Peace is the only One who can stoke and stir the hearts of men away from the violence of self-serving agendas to obedience to God and the service of others. And a fire such as this kindles the greatest peace imaginable.”

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Author:Craig D. Lounsbrough
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“The peace of men is nothing than a tentative and deluded calm under which the turbulence of men’s greed roils and churns. In time the waters of gluttony and winds of selfishness turn the seas wild and dangerous. The resources of men dispatched to calm the tumult find themselves tossed and helpless is the rage of mankind gone mad. And it is God who passes a steadying hand over the surging seas and orders all to a calm that leaves the resources of men subdued and their souls awed. And God stands ready to bring this formidable power into the center of the greatest storms imaginable…and those are the storm within us.”

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Author:Craig D. Lounsbrough
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