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Matters of strength and power

What is the difference between strength and power? In short, strength is gained through years of toil and sweat. Many times, power can be cheap because it is usually bestowed, often abused, and can be very dangerous. As a teenager, my uncle Johnny would tell me two beautiful stories that would answer this question.

Uncle Johnny was among the first to land at Normandy on D-Day. His unit fought many battles while freeing small towns all the way through France. Orders came for his company to blow up a German ammunition dump. While doing so, they lost six men but did their job and chased the Germans out. The little town was very grateful. The men in town dug the graves behind a church in a peaceful cemetery. That evening, the troops were invited by different families to join them in the evening meal.

Uncle Johnny found himself at the humble dwelling of a man, his wife, two sons, and their daughter. The daughter was the principal of the local grade school. After dinner, the young woman announced they would begin school tomorrow. “Aren’t you afraid the Germans might return?” Her answer was as strong as the bravest soldier was. “The American soldiers put an American flag in front of our church where we buried some of your buddies. School shall be no problem.”

With the war won, his unit freed “a Nazi war camp.” The soldiers never used the word concentration camp. Uncle Johnny said he saw the strongest, toughest men break down and cry at the condition of those poor prisoners. He told me a skeleton of a human being draped his body on him, his skinny bones digging into his chest. He whispered into Uncle Johnny’s ear. “Please come with me. My friend is very sick.” With tears in his eyes and the war far behind him, he said, “that is the strongest person I ever met.”

Meanwhile, Hitler died like the coward he was — from a self-inflicted gunshot, in a bunker, hiding from the world. Not all the power in the world could save him.

Strength or power — you decide…

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