During the homily of a Catholic mass that I                                                                                 recently attended, the priest discussed how Jesus told his disciples to refer to God as Abba, Father. The implication of this is that we are all God’s children, and hence, we are all brothers and sisters. Geneticists and scientists believe we all came from some common ancestor who spawned Homo Sapiens. If we take the Bible literally, we all are descendants of Adam and Eve. Whatever angle we look at it, whether we are staunch atheists and scientists, evolution believers, Bodhisattvas of compassion and interrelationship, or take the Bible word-for-word, we are all connected and interconnected in body and in soul.

If we connect the dots of every one of us, past, present, and future, it becomes clearer that we are all part of a great web, woven and held together by how we relate to one another. Kind interactions strengthen the connections, and violent ones weaken some of the strands. We are all part of life on this planet. We are all brothers and sisters. We are all one family. Let’s all work together to love and respect one another and weave a strong family web for ourselves and for our children.