Tom, your comments remind me of Greenleaf's frequent quoting of Dean Inge's line: "Faith is the choice of the nobler hypothesis.” As early as 1935 Greenleaf argued publicly that one should look for potentials in people rather than liabilities, not to satisfy duty or to trigger the power of positive thinking or to "maximize returns on human resources" (I hate that modern phrase), but because it is the nobler choice.

That works for me.
Don Frick | 01.05.06 - 3:33 pm | #

Don,

Thanks for your thoughts. There was something about the idea of looking for the "Go(o)d" in people that really struck me as something to pay attention to when I first read it. When I am able to do it, it is amazing how different I percieve people and the world around me. The problem I have is it is too easy to slip back in looking at the negative or treating others as simply "resources".

Tom
Tom Jablonski | 01.06.06 - 8:40 pm | #