Source: Notes on Arab Orthodoxy
Those who love one another do not flee from one another. We remain together and we always try to be committed to one another. Remaining with others when we know their sins or their weekness is difficult. However, God has revealed to us that we are brothers and that we are called to remain His family-- that is, one family in Him. You make people your brothers if you love them. There is always a distance between people because of differences of convictions and temperaments but God has commanded us to see that brothers are one, even if they forget that fact.
How do they live together in peace if they do not believe that the Lord loved them and made them one? This is hard work in many cases, but it is what God has demanded so that we may know that we are His children. Temperaments have differed among people since creation and the difficulties of life have become more varied but humankind cannot live in combat or hatred. Love is an effort. You do not have it from your mother's womb. It comes to you first by God's grace and second by your effort. That is, it increases if you so desire and if your Lord so desires.
You belong to your Lord and to the people with whom you live. It is for them first of all that you make an effort. Those who are closest to you in location are the ones whom you love first. You are not a world unto yourself. You are not closed off. You love people and they love you and in this way you live together. You must draw near to them so that your love for them will increase and so that their love for you will increase. A believing society is those people who know that they are brothers or whom God has made brothers. In this way they become one family, God's family.
Different mothers bore us, but we must become God's family through love. My father is not your father and my mother is not your mother, but the Lord sees us as one and inspires us to feel that we are brothers.
Living among people is an effort, a coming together. It is you and I and I am not imposed upon you. You and I are different from the start of our effort. What is needed is our unity, despite differences of temperament and convictions. That is, the only thing that is needed is the love that transcends the difference into which we were born or raised.
Perfect unity between people is not possible. It is an effort, but it is a fundamental effort if we do not want to fight or slaughter one another. Our mothers bore us free to strive for our unity in love, since there is no other unity. Goodwill towards all, intellectual development and love are our common endeavor if we do not want the human race to perish.
Our unity, if we are believers, is God's work through His grace, but along with this it is the work of our desire for the good of all people. God created the world and left it for us to make through our love. The universe does not develope organically from itself. It is human beings who cause it to perish through their sins or make it live through their love.
The unity of mankind comes through our love for one another. We perfect it every day by gratuitously doing good works for all people, since they all need them and through them become new humans.
