Confronting Social Injustices

In the book The Tale of Two Cities, the author Charles Dickens begins by criticizing the aristocrats' treatment of the poor people of France--the shameless corruption, abuse, and inhumanity of the French nobles towards the peasantry. Even "church leaders entertained themselves with some 'humane' actions as sentencing a youth to have his hands cut off, his tongue torn out with princers, and his body burned alive--because he had not kneeled down, in the rain, to honor a procession of monks some fifty or sixty yards away." Dickens ends by noting that the same social atrocities occur even when the power shifts from the aristocrats to the lower classes--the masses, oppressed for centuries, rise up at last and destroy their masters becoming themselves just as evil and corrupt.

There is always a danger that this scenario could happen when social injustices are confronted, especially if a person or a people focuses on his or their victimization. Therefore, when confronting social injustices it would be wise to do so in a spirit of reconciliation and forgiveness rather than in a spirit of revenge and retaliation. It is only through the former that everyone can start to heal and move forward--and thus, break the unproductive cycle.

A Spiritual Leader Writes

Dr. Festus Obiakor from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee gave a presentation at BYU called Let Your Work Speak.

In order to have one's work speak, a spiritual leader will take time to read, ponder, reflect, and write. In other words, if spiritual leaders are to make a difference for diverse learners, they must think. Albert Einsten said, "The world we have created is a product of our thinking; it cannot be changed without changing our thinking." If the dismal education world for diverse learners is going to change, there must be a change in thinking.

Benjamin Disraeli said, "The best way to become acquainted with a subject is to write a book about it." Well, it may not have to be a book, but it at least needs to be a journal article (even if it is rejected!) or it may be no more than a "Letter to the Editor" or a personal journal entry.

This writing must not be done to please others, but it must follow the counsel of William Wordsworth, "Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart....." One of the greatest writers of all time, Charles Dickens, learned this lesson. It was when he remembered and reflected upon his own life--the difficulties of his life--- and combined the images of the present with the past that he experienced an enormous burst of creative energy that subordinated all his problems, including his own depression and the possibility of financial ruin. The result of that burst of creative energy was the magnificent story, A Christmas Carol, which has blessed so many lives.


We learn from this incident in the life of Charles Dickens that not only does writing clear the cobwebs out of one's own head, but "The skill of writing is to create a context in which other people can think" (Edwin Schlossberg) and "But words are things, and a small drop of ink, Falling, like dew, upon a thought, produces That which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think" (Lord Byron). And I would add, feel.

Edward Bulwer-Lytton eloquently expressed the impact writing can have on those who do the writing as well as those who read it: "The pen is mightier than the sword."