I just finished watching Batman Begins. For, at the time, an unknown reason, I felt compelled to watch it again. In the movie Ra’s Al Guhl, the head of the League of Shadows, is intent on destroying Gotham. The League’s charter over the centuries has been to destroy cities and countries that lost their way and whose people were living in ways that man was never intended to live. Ra’s decided that Gotham was beyond hope of redemption.

I thought of civilizations past. Rome during Nero, the Minoans, Atlantis, Sodom and Gomorrah — the list goes on. It appears endless. They didn’t have Batman to save them.

As I watched visions flow through awareness I thought of the United States and wondered what Ra’s Al Guhl would think? Are we on his short list of civilizations that have lost their way irreparably? Are we on his list of civilizations taking their last breath, that have no good left in them?

I started ticking through the list of ills.

Just this weekend …

I read about several mass shootings. We live now in a world of horrifics. It is horrific to be a parent of school age children. You send them off to a prom and don’t know if they will come home or not. The horrifics used to be far off, in some other country. Now they are next door. Perhaps our inaction sowed the seeds for the growth of horror here. Could hate and wanton murder thrive in a world of morality, integrity and compassion for all?

I watched a couple videos about fraud and voter disenfranchisement. It seems those in power right here at home fear the people’s vote. They have found way to give the appearance of free elections without the risk of losing. Power over others reigns. Service to the people is a rarity. It wasn’t that long ago that wasn’t so.

I saw so many conflicting ‘truths’ that knowing what is actually real becomes more than difficult. It is impossible when the information and intelligence used is mass disseminated and owned by a tiny few. The conflicting stories are designed to make people mistrust, fear, hate, and act out in ways that are harmful to themselves and to others. A well informed public evidently is not in the best interest of those in power.

Bathroom wars, attempts to make the LGBT community a scapegoat for the hatred. If that doesn’t work fingers point to immigrants, Muslims, Hispanics. We let them die by the boatful, or dehydration in the dessert, immune to their suffering. Is that any different that what Hitler did to the Jews, what Pol Pot did in Cambodia or what is happening across our world in so many painful places?

What would Ra’s say? Looking at it through the lens of man, he would be right to say we are a lost cause.

The hate and fear would be overwhelming if I still lived in the world of man’s craziness. I don’t and no one needs to remain mired in the insanity of separation. If we are to redeem ourselves and our civilization we can only do so with a change of compass, not simply a moral compass, but a return to Spirit, to Love, Caring and Compassion, a recognition of the Truth that each man and woman is my brother and sister, and we are all children of God.

How can I know this is true with all the information to the contrary? Divine intelligence resides in the heart’s center. When we lean in and listen, empty of our human knowing, the doors swing wide to the repository of truth.Trusting the mind, informed by propaganda and misinformation is a fool’s game. Trust the heart. The heart knows.

What does it know? Stop and feel and you will know the truth. It feels wrong to hate anyone for any reason. The heart aches when it feels the existence of hatred. It cries out when the mind forms around hate of any kind. It is heartbreaking to watch others suffer, to sit in relative comfort and do nothing as immigrants are forced out of their homes and in desperation drown in the oceans attempting to find peace and freedom, simply doing what any one of us would do to find safety from harm for our families. Or even closer to home, to drive by the homeless and look the other way, not even acknowledging the brother or sister on the curb. Have you ever watched a homeless person’s face as car after car goes by without the decent respect for their humanity? Invisible. The cells fill up with sadness when we judge and condemn anyone, ourselves included. No wonder we are such a sick society.

Anything but love feels wrong to the heart. It hurts because we aren’t these separate sacks of flesh. We are love incarnated. Those things we do that hurt any other, hurt us. We are hurting ourselves and can’t know it until we stop and listen to the heart and feel the pain.

We are at a tipping point. We have come to a time where we decide if we move forward or continue to devolve into one of those civilizations that used to be. All boats rise with the consciousness of love. Batman was right when he said that Gotham could still be saved. It is never too late for love.