Here in New Harmony, one of my favorite places of prayer is the sculpture of Tobi Kahn, a renowned Jewish artist from New York. The piece is called Shalev, or Angel of Compassion. It is a twelve-foot-high granite archway under which the angel of compassion is passing. She is a life-sized human figure made of gleaming bronze, and her head and entire posture incline with presence. The archway has always felt to me like the archway of the present moment, the archway of every moment. And the angel is like a messenger of the Living Presence, inclining with compassion, accompanying us and our world as we enter the archway of the present.
The task of making peace ... is not just a matter of realpolitik; it is a matter also of spirit. It requires us not only to deal with the practicalities of our place in the cosmic order of things. We must know who we are and what we are doing -- know not only with the intellect, but with our whole being, in the way that mystics have always achieved the knowledge that has given our species its deepest guidance.
