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In KC yesterday ACT for America demonstrated against Muslims in America. Formally they demonstrated against a non-existent problem: Sharia Law taking over America. But actually it's a way to organize against our Muslim neighbors.

Some of us came together last evening at the Unitarian Universalist Church in Lenexa to demonstrate that we are all Americans regardless of our religious affiliation.

I spoke about the hatred that can be manifest in any religion: Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism -- all of which at specific times and places have murdered in cold blood supposedly for the sake of God's name.

It's not the religion that murders. It's people, rationalizing their hatred through religious belief. So these neighbors gathered in mutual support, and dined together afterward, hosted by the Muslims.

Our choice is clear: day by day WE must act according to the peace we desire in the world. It starts with us.

Rev. Dr. Theodor Parker, a 19th century Unitarian Universalist minister, first spoke the words paraphrased by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., "The arc of history is long, but it bends toward justice."

The world effectively decreases in size daily. Wars in S. Sudan, Somalia, Myanmar, the South China Sea, the Congo, Philippines or anyway in the world effect our lives personally. We have truly entered a new world, and if we are not to destroy ourselves, then we individually must demonstrate the courage to insist on living as we wish the world to be, unafraid and undeterred.

Now is the time. And today is the only day we have to create a harmonious world. This harmony is not some utopian dream as might once have been the case. It has become a existential necessity. If we do not live together in harmony, we will die together in agony.