St. John's Church

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Talk to the Neighbor You Don't Know

I have had the distinct privilege of walking through many archeological sites and seeing, of course, many statues of various figures in ancient history.  Looking through the Arts section of the New York Times I came across an article reviewing the exhibition of Ancient Greece that will be at the Onassis Cultural Center in Manhattan in lune.  There are several pictures of faces of stone.  This kind of statuary so often looks lifeless, cold, and restrained because, of course, it is often made of marble.I was caught by the subtitle of the article, "An Exhibition of Ancient Greek Art Unmasks Explosive Feelings Behind Those Stony Faces."   It gave me pause to think about how we make first impressions on people and miss what is behind those faces.  Oftentimes we misjudge people, thinking that they are cold or snobby when they actually are some of the warmest and kindest human beings we would ever want to meet.  Sometime we have to "chip away" at our own hardened reactions we have towards people.  Perhaps the same thing takes place with biased or racial "profiling".  Once you talk and get to know people, you can discover a whole universe that, in most cases, will enrich you.