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Thank you, Paul Stanbrook, for your fine letter in Saturday’s paper. https://www.thesnaponline.com/2020/06/26/letter-to-the-editor-we-are-the-problem-intolerance-is-the-problem/

How very important, especially in these days, to take a stand against intolerance.

If the past months have brought any blessing at all, it is that each of us have recognized anew the value, respect and appreciation every other person deserves

For collectively we are responsible for the services and products required from our economy, the critical research for our collective advancement, the availability and vital advantage of outstanding medical care and the unselfish giving of support and outreach to the emotional and physical needs of others.

How can we as a nation continue to justify discussion of who will be discriminated against, demonstrations reminding us how to live together in community, protests demanding new attention to the same generational social problems or policy decisions that affect people disproportionately?

All issues that should have been decided correctly generations ago.

But all issues are repeated again and again in the public square in a nation founded on a principle that all are created equal, each person with inalienable rights, including “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

“How long?” asks the Psalmist. (Ps. 13) “How long?” before there are answers and solutions to sorrow, enemies, pain. Racial divide, economic and social injustice, opportunity of and for pursuing happiness. “How long?”

Perhaps, if each of us worked diligently for the same kind of expansive attitude as Mr. Stanbrook, the answer could be “Sooner than might ordinarily be expected.”

Jim Sawyer
Albemarle