10.35 One Voice

I was talking to my son who is in 8th grade in a New York City school and he told me how his friends suddenly make political statements, such as Trump is terrible. My son said that he won't talk about his political views which are conservative with his friends.  He doesn't want to lose them so he keeps his mouth shut.  My wife won't challenge statements by her friend expressing hostility to Republicans and to Trump.  I won't challenge her friends either because I don't want to stop them from being her friend.

Many people avoid relationships with people with different politics.  I have a friend who was very attached to a girl he was dating at the University of Pennsylvania.  The moment she found out he had conservative and pro-Israel views she became very hostile and ended her relationship with him.  He could have been silent about his political views and maybe he could have married the girl he was dating at Penn. Should anyone have to hide their views like that?  Later on he found another woman who shares his views and who married him.   Some people stop talking to their parents it they have different political views.  People often assume that if someone has a different viewpoint they are a bad person.

Friends should be able to disagree and still be friends.  The same applies to people in a family.  People can learn from each other if they don't assume that the other person is evil for believing something else.  Unfortunately many people will not do that.  The result of expressing your views in many cases is they hold on to their views and end their friendship with you. 

Should we stay silent?  There is a song in Disney's  Alladin movie called Speechless in which Jasmine sings that she won't be silent.  She won't let the very scary Jafar shut her up. 

There is a real life Jasmine.  Her name is Yasmeen Mohammad.  Here she speaks about about how she won't be silenced about speaking the truth about Islam.

There is a saying that ""The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."

Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a very brave German who opposed Hitler.  He sabotaged Nazi plans and secretly tried to save as many Jews as possible from the Nazis. He was also part of an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate Hitler.  He was hanged shortly by the Nazis before the end of World War 2.  Bonhoeffer wrote:

Silence in the face of evil is itself evil.  God will not hold us guiltless.  Not to speak is to speak.  Not to act is to act. 

and:

We are not simply to bandage the wounds of victims beneath the wheels of injustice.  We are to drive a spoke in the wheel itself.

 Donald Trump's political opponents like to accuse him of being a Nazi yet his opponents tend to support the Hamas Nazis and Trump is very pro-Israel.  In this speech he says how we won't be silent when people deny that the Holocaust happened.

 I pointed out to my son that if no one speaks up there is no one to challenge the lies.  My son said that his friends won't change their mind if he says something.  I told him if he says something he plants a seed that at some future date might make a difference.  There have been times when I have spoken up and to my surprise people who I thought disagreed with me agreed with me and spoke up as well.

Martin Niemöller (1892–1984) was a prominent Lutheran pastor in Germany. After Adolf Hitler came to power in 1933, Niemöller became an outspoken critic of Hitler’s interference in the Protestant Church. He didn't speak out against Hitler's persecution of other groups.  He spent the last eight years of Nazi rule, from 1937 to 1945, in Nazi prisons and concentration camps. After the war Niemöller said:

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

 Sometimes we do have to protect ourselves.  Shouting "I love Israel" and waving an Israeli flag amidst a mob of Hamas supporters is suicidal.  Sometimes the price for speaking up is too high.  However that doesn't mean we shouldn't find safer ways to speak up or get our message across.  No matter what we do though there will always be a risk when we speak the truth that others don't want spoken.

There have been people who have had tremendous courage and who have spoken out and in the end won against overwhelming odds.  One of those people is Natan Sharansky.

There is a hebrew song by Rabbi Nachman of Breslov (Ukraine, 1772-1810).  The songs words are:

"The whole entire world is a very narrow bridge and the main thing is to have no fear at all"

The world is a very narrow bridge is another way of saying it's a dangerous place.  If we are afraid we won't speak up for the truth.  Here is a nice performance of that song.

Barry Manilow is a singer who started out as a song writer.  He sent tapes around of his music for years hoping someone would sing his songs and got rejected every time.  Finally he ran out of money and had to sing his own demos.  Then he got offered a record contract.  He didn't realize it but he's a great singer and a great song writer.  One of his songs is One Voice about how if one voice speaks up in the darkness others will join. 

Lea Salonga sings it in the video below.  Many fans of all ages recognize Lea as the singing voice of Princess Jasmine from Aladdin and Fa Mulan for Mulan and Mulan II. For her portrayal of the beloved princesses, the Walt Disney Company bestowed her with the honor of “Disney Legend”.  She is famous for other performances such as Kim in Miss Saigon and Eponine and Fantine in two different shows of Les Miserables.  She does a fantastic job singing One Voice in the video below.

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