My oldest daughter Kate is in Washington DC this weekend to participate in the Immigration March.  She is very passionate about this issue, having spent much of the last year in Central America and in border towns in both the U.S. and Mexico.  She apparently believes that what disrespects any one of us, disrespects us all.  What dehumanizes any one of us, dehumanizes us all.  This is a beautiful lesson consistent with the perspective that across all of humanity, truly we all are one.

I am reminded of Ernest Hemmingway’s novel set during the Spanish Civil War of the 1930′s.  The author incorporates the meditational quote from the metaphysical poet John Donne.  He refers to the sound of a funeral bell.   I will include it here:

For Whom the Bell Tolls

by John Donne

No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manner of thine own
Or of thine friend’s were.
Each man’s death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,  It tolls for thee