About The champion newspaper. (Decatur, GA) 19??-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 10, 2019)
THE CHAMPION, THURSDAY, JANUARY 10 -16, 2019 PAGE 7B WORLD Continued From Page 6 will impact the community and world in some way. Each of us is therefore responsible for our community and world. Eveiy person we meet and eveiy conversation we have, we learn something new. As we are living in a melting pot, to understand and respect diversity is the first step to have a balanced pot or a better community. We were all given pollution-free hearts and minds when we were born, so let’s take one step at a time to retain or repair our hearts and minds as an innocent child to treat people right, love people, trust people, and forgive people. We need to teach our children universal acceptance and constantly remind others to practice such refinement by our own actions. Ke: Practice strategic defiance, civil disobedience. If something looks wrong to you, step up, speak up, ask hard questions, especially of elected officials, all of whom live quite well on our dime. Don’t just be a disgruntled bystander: silence becomes complicity. Check out a great book by Stephane Hessel called Indignez Vous! Silence and passivity and complacency can kill as many innocents as Fascists with guns. Those Axis nations of WWII had no historical references for where their leaders were taking them — but we do, because we sent an entire generation of boys to fight Fascists and Nazis. Why are some of us now embracing those values. Semmes: Although its au thorship is in question, there is a phrase that looms large when considering what one person can do to make the world a bet ter place: “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting some great battle” Simple acts of kindness, performed one at a time, speak to Mother Teresa’s belief that we can’t, as individuals, fix all the world’s problems. We can only address the challenges im mediately in front of us, but to do so would change the world...one small step at the time. WHAT’S TOPS ON YOUR PRA YER/WISH LIST FOR 2019? Bennafield: I pray for wisdom, understanding, healthy strong families, awesome relationships, safety and contentment in our world, countiy, state, county and neighborhoods. And I pray that all of our churches and places of faith come together in prayer to encourage members and congregants to get involved and make 2019 one of our best years yet. Finally, I pray for greater faith so that we can see and have the things hoped for that are presently unseen. Chang: I wish all to be healthy, happy, safe and loved. I wish all can spread more love, show a little more compassion, be a little more tolerant, be a little less greedy, and share joy and happiness to all. Finally, I wish all to experience the true happiness that comes from giving rather than receiving. To live in a better world and a better community starts with being a better individual. Fet’s all tiy to improve ourselves first and influence others with our true heart and spirit. Ke: Fet’s move the “policy- design needle” towards making child well being a top-3 national priority. If we want humanity to thrive, we have to understand they ’re all our kids. We need to take better care of them, from prenatal until they launch their careers, and we need to get those 14,000-plus migrant kids out of those border concentra tion camps. We should stop warehousing children in refugee camps, where their educations are interrupted for years. No more school shootings. It makes no sense that teachers have to work 2.5 jobs just to scrape by when hedge fund managers game the system (carried-interest loophole) and C-suites drive their companies into the ground, then make off with millions. Secure CHIP funding and never again use it as politicized barter ing chip for partisan skirmishes in Congress. Invest in interna tional-education programming for our kids, because the world’s getting smaller. Make college more affordable, more acces sible. We have a huge military arsenal, but we defund our chil dren’s opportunities—and then employers complain about the quality of the workforce. When you neglect your gardens, you can’t expect a good harvest. Semmes: Peace and love...on the world stage, in our national conversations and in my own soul. I can’t think of anything more important.
