My Love Of What I Own May Be Killing Somebody Somewhere

"Therefore, if I don't pretend, like other people, to understand the war, I do know this much: that the knowledge of what is going on only makes it seem desperately important to be voluntarily poor, to get rid of all possessions this instant. I am scared, sometimes, to own anything, even a name, let alone coin, or share in the oil, the munitions, the airplane factories. I am scared to take a proprietary interest in anything, for fear that my love of what I own may be killing somebody somewhere."

--Thomas Merton, from a diary entry during WWII reflecting upon the connections between possessions and complicity in violence worldwide

HT: Experimental Theology