Letter: U.S. has become too egotistical for peace

Monday, July 9, 2007 | 7:12 a.m.

An u nhappy reality is that we Americans have shown that we believe more in war than in peace. After all, peace requires that we must live with others, deal with their problems, make true concessions and compromises with them, and accept them as equals - not inferiors.

War, however, is far easier than peace. In war you simply kill those you don't agree with. You don't have to deal with them again and their problems no longer exist. But peace, like truth and character, is a more difficult route.

America has forgotten that the wages of war are sin and death, while the benefits of peace are virtue and life. Our nation no longer remembers that virtue is its own reward. Our moral satisfaction lies in a self-perceived secure state of autonomy - we can do no wrong because God is on our side and we have love in our hearts.

We therefore do not require approval by anyone for meaning or purpose. Such an egotistical vice must constantly find new territories of crime, to obscure its absence of moral meaning and purpose.

By harboring the illusion we are "the" center of the world, rather than "a" center of the world, Americans would believe themselves destined as history's godly endowed progressive savior, under attack by evil everywhere. This is a fatal attitude because such an unchecked nation, like an unchecked malignancy, is always removed by nature or it simply destroys itself.

Neil J. Mizen, Las Vegas