MY TURN: Changes taking place
I am a 40+ year resident of North Idaho, a transplant from Montana. It has been a wonderful place to live. People generally have had a respect for God, America and each other. However, I have seen changes taking place here, along with the rest of the country, that makes it a less hospitable place for all of us.
Issues come up in any group of people and differences of opinion are inevitable. That is normal and truly desired in order to bring out all facets of an issue. What I see happening in Coeur d'Alene, copying the rest of the country, is issues themselves and their respective pros and cons get lost in the vilification of the people on both sides of the issue.
I felt like we hit a new low when pastors were criticized in the paper, for influencing the vote on the library board. Whether they did or not is not the issue, as I see it. The fact that pastors are castigated for speaking about what they saw as a moral issue is the epitome of "cancel culture." Christian pastors, priests have a clear mandate in their "job description" to speak of the merits of God and Jesus and to give clear guidance on what God says on any moral issue. If we deny them that, we can't call ourselves a free country.
The larger issue is the way we think about and treat each other. Issues are issues and people are people. I think if we continue down this path of trying to destroy people and their reputations, regardless of the issue, we will all be losers in the end. I shudder at the way we are getting to feel about each other on the opposite side of issues. If you study history or current activists, one of the tools they use is to get people to take sides on any issue and exploit their feelings of animosity to get them to distrust, dislike, destroy each other, and sweep in and use the turmoil for advantage.
We need to realize that in the end we, and our grandchildren will live in the atmosphere we are creating. Jesus gave two commandments in the New Testament. One was to love God, the second was to love each other and treat them as we treat ourselves, Mark 12:30-31. It seems that as we get away from the first, the second gets lost. It is a grief to see this happening in our wonderful Coeur d'Alene community. We can do better.
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Patty Mitchell is a Coeur d'Alene resident.