Heart Center of Intelligence Part 6
January 2, 2026
Photos taken of female Nazi SS guards after their capture. These young women, once innocent little girls, killed and tortured thousands of innocent people in the concentration camps of WWII. May God heal their souls. May those in our society now, male and female, who have similar hatreds and passions, be understood, soothed, and healed before they destroy the innocent and become fodder for destruction, themselves.
The Heart Center of Intelligence Part 6
The grandmother, who as a schoolteacher, once nurtured children every day, can justify separating babies from their mothers, and this should terrify us all. How does a human heart travel from tenderness to atrocity? The distance is shorter than we think.
In the German film Never Look Away, a female Nazi SS guard is herding girls and women into a gas chamber under the pretense that they are going to take a shower. A young prisoner with Down Syndrome looks at the woman guard and says, “I love you” to which the guard replies with a smile, “I love you too.” The smiling guard leaves and the gas is turned on in the “showers.” That was the little girl’s last time to say, “I love you” and unbeknownst to her, she said it to her murderer.
How is it conceivable that anyone could harm or kill children and adults with smiles on their faces? The fact is that the hearts of even the most tender of us can be hardened, given the right set of circumstances. Circumstances such as childhood verbal, physical, and sexual abuse, sado-masochism, hatred, violence, and mental torture can all convene to distort the heart of an otherwise normal human being. Then, if such damaged and vulnerable people are in a context that rewards cruelty and violence, torturers and murders emerge, male and female alike. These are the circumstances of which a venerated statesperson recently said, “bring out our worst impulses.”
How can a society have a collective hardened heart so severe that even the man and woman on the street condone killing, separating children from their parents, and hating other ethnicities and religions? The simple answer is fear. If enough of us are fearful of losing power, economic advantage, and racial superiority, then any extreme measure will be justified. Recently a very sweet grandmother and retired elementary school teacher said, “I don’t want to separate babies from their mothers, but if that is what it takes to teach those people a lesson, then they asked for it.”
The Greyhound bus was firebombed by a KKK mob in Anniston, Alabama, on May 14, 1961. It carried seven Freedom Riders, two journalists, the bus driver, and five regular passengers. They prevented the people within the bus from escaping the inferno. Finally, a window was broken, the doors opened, and the fifteen innocent people were saved. Recently a man who still lives near where the bus was burned told a group of ICBers on a pilgrimage there, “They got what they deserved; they shouldn’t have been here anyway.”
Yes, even our helpers and regular people can be desensitized to unspeakable atrocities against fellow human beings. Hatred blocks these dear souls from the prospect of allowing everyone a place at the table and helping the marginalized to create better lives and a better society. Instead, they are hypnotized into believing that hatred and killing of the innocent is not only acceptable, but called for.
Spiritual practice: Read Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. What does it say to you about the power of love?
Self-inquiry: What could possibly desensitize you to the act of murder?
Prayer:
Dear God, I too am vulnerable. I too have fears and anxieties. Please heal these instead of my becoming fodder for the hatred machine that infects so many of our hearts. Amen.
