Since my last post, I've had a number of reproachful, more-in-sorrow-than-anger emails from Jewish and Isra'eli (no, they are not necessarily the same thing) friends who see my words as detracting and devaluing the Jewish tragedy of the holocaust.
I have a couple of responses from Muslim friends, too, who are upset that I place the word "politics" in the some context as their reservations about Holocaust Memorial Day.
Then there are some Jehovah's Witness friends who are hurt that I associated them with commitment to pacifism rather than including them with the groups who died for their beliefs.
And then I have others from...
I regret that. Nothing could be further from my intent than to devalue or detract from anyone or anything. But ... I can't, in conscience, change or retract anything. I longer have the unqualified belief I once held that "the truth will set you free", but I do believe that, in most cases, truth is a better (I would never say easy, or perfect; just better) route to the future than its absence.
The truth is, of course, a complex, elusive, many splintered thing. I don't claim to have access to more of it than any of these friends, who all send me the truth as they honestly see it from where they stand. I do, however, think that what can be seen where I stand is an equally vital piece of the jigsaw.
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