Won’t
You Be My Neighbor
Carolyn
and I went to see Won’t You Be My Neighbor Friday night. I was deeply touched by the simple messages
of hope and esteem that this man, Fred Rogers, presented. He gave us esteem, wholesome concepts like
honesty, acceptance, responsibility and many other great concepts, during his
fifty years of being in the public eye.
And
in his theme song, this lyric speaks loudly today. “Would you be mine?”.
The
full lyric is”
“So,
let’s make the most of this beautiful day.
Since
we’re together we might as well say:
Would
you be mine??
I
have to couch this in the context of what I’m seeing in our world today, especially
in America. I have been threatened no
less than ten times to be unfriended because of the way I voted in the last election. I have been accused of having less than
righteous morals, poor judgment, lacking in mental acuity, and just being plain
un-American.
This
is wrong! It is wrong on so many
levels.
My
friends, I live next door to you. I shop
in the same grocery store and buy my gas at the same places you do. I attended the same college/university as
you. In many cases, I attended the same
denominational church you attended. And
now … just because I made a different choice from you, I am a lesser
specimen.
I
don’t think so.
My
view … we are neighbors. You may live in
Tennessee, New Mexico, or any other parts of this great land, yet we are neighbors. The globe has shrunken to ‘everybody is my
neighbor.’
I
never get far from this John Kennedy quote:
Our most basic common like is that
we all inhabit this planet.
We all breathe the same air.
We all cherish our children's future.
And we are all mortal.
We
get to choose. We get to vote as we see
fit. We get to voice our opinions. And it stops there. We don’t coerce, we don’t force a decision
for who or what or how to believe, and we don’t threaten or commit violence if
we don’t get our way. After all, we all
breathe the same air. And we cherish our
futures and those of our kids and grandkids.
We
are reasonable adults, and I call upon reasonable and responsible actions from
all of us in managing our frustrations, our angst, our disappointments and our
concerns.
And, perhaps, I call for prayer for ALL of our leaders. A L L !
I
hope to God a civil war never shows its ugly face on our land again. I pray for tolerance, understanding, and a
grand sense of “won’t you be my neighbor” to come sweeping over all of us.
What
do you say … neighbor?
This is what is on
my mind today.
P Michael Biggs
Offering
Hope
Encouragement
Inspiration
