The belief in a God who is far away from us, “over there,” and who wants and needs or desires or demands something from those of us “over here,” is what allows humans to grant themselves the moral authority to inflict punishments of their own upon those who they believe have ignored God’s Word and disobeyed God’s Commandments.
We imagine and declare ourselves to be acting in God’s name as we throw the switch on the electric chair, or throw people behind bars for 20 years, or throw our weight around in whatever other way we have bestowed it upon ourselves to do, in retribution for the sins that others have committed.
This idea is what allows humans to fly airplanes into buildings, killing thousands of innocent civilians all the while shouting “Allah is great!” It is what allows humans to preemptively strike a nation that they imagine is going to strike them if they don’t do it first, killing thousands of innocent civilians with bombs paid for by coins on which it is written…“In God We Trust.”
If we thought we were doing these things to God, we would, of course…

…never do them. Yet there is nothing that could make us think that we are doing these things to God except the thought that We And God Are One, and that is a thought that the largest number of humans have summarily rejected.
Separation Theology produces a Separation Cosmology. That is, a cosmological
way of looking at all of Life which holds that everything is separate from everything else. Separation Cosmology produces a Separation Sociology. That is, a way of socializing the human species that separates every person from every other person by declaring their interests to be separate. Separation Sociology produces a Separation Pathology. That is, pathological behaviors of self-destruction – demonstrated individually and collectively.
Now, what does all this have to do with Myanmar? Everything.
If we thought we were all One, the situation in Myanmar could not occur. The conditions leading to it could not develop. The ability of most of the world to look away would not exist. The actions of Than Shwe would be impossible. The position of China would be untenable. The statements of Ibrahim Gambari would be unnecessary.
Mr. Gambari, as you no doubt know, is the special envoy of United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, sent to Myanmar for a 4-day emergency trip the week before last. He was dispatched by Ban after the ruling junta in Myanmar, whose senior general is Than Shwe, began a brutal crackdown on Buddhist monks and those who joined them in recent protests against the government.
That crackdown has allegedly included after-curfew raids on private homes, beatings, arbitrary arrests and disappearances, according to Mr. Gambari’s report. I am sure you all know all about this. It has been a headline story in every major newspaper, Internet news site, and television news show for days on end now.
What you may or may not know is the political basis of the inaction that has occurred within the international community in the aftermath of this. It is the same political consideration that has allowed most of the despotism that has ever occurred in the world to have taken place – whether it is in Myanmar and Darfur today, or right in the place from which I am writing this…Germany, in 1943.
In the present instance China, which borders Myanmar and is one of its few allies and trading partners, has argued that the crisis does not constitute the kind of threat to international peace and security that calls for involvement or intervention by the United Nations.
(This is the second of a three-part series. The third installment will be found here on Thursday. NOTE: This weblog creates, for us all, a chance to meet at the interaction of Life and the New Spirituality. It is written by the author of Conversations with God, the worldwide best-selling series of books. The “New Spirituality” is defined by the author as “a new way to experience and express our natural impulse toward the Divine without making others wrong for the way in which they are doing it.”)