TOKEN OF ESTEEM AND RESPECT

 We live in a broad minded, tolerant age, but we make a mistake if we imagine intolerance is dead, it is not so easily detected as it once was, but it is still with us and still clogs the wheels of progress by poisoning the spirit of fellowship, without which real human progress is impossible.

A bugbear of modern sport is the spirit of jealousy; we hardly have a sport which is not professionalized and commercialised, today, with the inevitable result of jealousy, intrigue and intolerance in many a form, often petty, but none the less mischievous.

Our class divisions are largely caused, or kept alive in a hostile condition by the spirit of intolerance which is unable or unwilling to see things from the other fellow’s point of view. Intolerance, which means inability or unwillingness to bear with one another, arises largely from ignorance or fear. It is today one the chief menaces to the worlds peace.

We have all seen this rotten spirit making miserable or destroying family life. In a family where each member will persist in thinking, not in terms of the family as a whole, but in terms of “number one” there is sure to be a lack of friendship and resultant misery. It is one of the ironies of life that societies and orders exist to promote fellowship, friendship, and mutual helpfulness are often cursed by the wretched spirit of intolerance.

As an Order we of the R.A.O.B. rejoice in the growth of forbearance good feeling and sympathy in our ranks, yet if we are honest we cannot say that we have attained the ideal in the matter of tolerance.

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