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The theologian, Reinhold Niebuhr had a realistic view of the human condition. We may have the best of intentions, but if we are strong enough to get our way, our intentions get distorted. Yet if our virtue has no force, it fades away. That is realism.

It is easy enough to accept that power corrupts. Thus has it always been. If we are able to achieve our aims, we do, unless something greater than power, restrains us* and permits goodness to prevail.  Yet love, by itself, must have some way to enforce itself, else it fades away. Strength needs love; love needs strength, yet the two do not always work together very smoothly.  That is often apparent in our own lives.

Consider a time when you knew what was best for someone else, but they did not cooperate so you had to force your will upon them, and someone paid a price. Or perhaps there was a time when you knew what was best for another but they ignored you, and you could only watch them go their way and someone paid a price.

Human history verifies Niebuhr. Our history is a history of corrupted good intentions. Over and over again. There are fewer examples of destroyed love because there are fewer instances of love, but there are more than enough examples of both, of perverted goodness and destroyed love, to justify Niebuhr’s insights.

*see Whispers numbers 1 and 3