Editor,

Following are some thoughts of sorrow, anger, fear, power to share about two walls.

A tall ugly, graffiti clad structure divides Bethlehem. It is not a big, beautiful wall. It is a wall that divides the children of Abraham and Sarah.

A wall of sorrows, anger, intimidation, apartheid, imposed by the powerful on the powerless.

A land-grabbing scar across the Holy Land, on both sides of the wall are bred distrust, fear, hatred. A structure that belies shalom/salaam.

A cement barrier that rips at the soul of a people, the soul of a people who suffered the evil of the Holocaust. But now driven by distrust, fear and political power. Deny dignity and respect toward the politically powerless.

The separation wall becomes a barrier to reconciliation. Will shalom ever mean, “Never again” to anyone?

Across the seas from Bethlehem, a bully has a vision of a wall —- a big, beautiful wall —- with ugly consequences. A wall born of disrespect toward the people of Aztlán, Tenochtitlán, Chichén Itzá.

The sons and daughters of these civilizations are called rapists and murders. This cruel barrier would divide the multicultural Valle del Rio Grande,

Separate the people/gente of Brownsville/Matamoros, El Paso/Juárez, San Diego/Tijuana. Lady Liberty sheds tears. A nation’s soul, threatened.

Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe sheds tears. Her people, los indios y mestizos, denied human dignity.

Reconciliation and social justice seem distant. Appeals made to hate and fear, a barrier to justice,

But yet, the better angels of our being offer hope.

Dick Hall

Coupeville