Words Matter

In 2016, Krista Tippet gave a talk a to the Unitarian Universalist Association's General Assembly. I

read it at the time and liked it. I reread it recently and liked it again. It is frustrating that these ideas can so easily become forgotten. This passage makes me want to use better words, but I'm not sure I know how.

Words Matter:...The words we use shape how we understand ourselves, how we interpret the world, how we treat others. And the world right now needs the most vivid, transformative universe of words that you and I can draw on and give voice to.

We chose too small a word in the decade of my birth, the 1960s, to grapple with the onset of genuine diversity in this country. And it does bear remembering that it was only in the 1960s that America truly began to integrate racial, religious, ethnic, and social differences into its national sense of self. We did so by pursuing the reasonable order that would be achieved by a civic mandate of tolerance.

Tolerance has value as a civic tool. But as I say, it's not big enough in human, ethical, or spiritual terms. Tolerance connotes allowing   

Tolerance, the word itself, connotes allowing, enduring, and indulging. And in the medical context, it is about the limits of thriving an unfavorable environment. Tolerance is not a lived virtue. It is kind of a cerebral assent and too cerebral for animate guts and behavior when the going gets rough. Tolerance has not taught or asked us to engage, much less to care about the stranger. Tolerance doesn't even invite us to understand, to be curious, to be open, to be moved or surprised by each other.

"Tolerance is not a lived virtue." Very good Krista. You can listen to or read her talk here. If you listen, the talk starts around 34 minutes.