On the anniversary of your birth, O Master, the human conscience recoils before its own reality — how far it stands from the meaning of your divine message!!

"Love one another..."

How often did your holy mouth intone this saying — preaching, speaking in parables, forgiving the Pharisees their unbelief and the sinners their transgressions, guiding the flock toward the safe pastures, that it might not stray and be lost.

"Love one another," O Master, remains the radiant center of the great inheritance you left to the children of the world twenty centuries ago. After you, your disciples carried it to the east of the earth and to its west, spurred on by a deep faith that they were laboring to lift humanity out of the pit of evil into the wide open space of peace...

O Master! The land your feet blessed, the mountains that danced beneath the rays of your eyes, the valleys that echoed back your teachings — all of it lies torn apart, threatened with destruction. Man is still a hypocrite, a corrupter, tainted in his intentions... and your teach-ings are still "for chanting"... Where are the hearts that take them in and act in their spirit?

And man?.. He is still all claw and fang; his strong roars over his weak, to swallow him whenever he pleases; and the tremendous power of the atom — the latest invention of his mind — is still an instrument of annihilation, not of security... Whence, then, shall tranquility flood men's souls, and peace hold sway over the universe?

On the anniversary of your birth, O Master, the faithful choke on their tears...

And the human conscience recoils before its own reality.

Can it be that your message has failed — the message for whose sake sacrifice itself was counted cheap?!