聽神談【人類文化中最須去除的迷思：「優越感」】
就是「優越感」的教誨導致了你們的世界裡有這麼多的痛苦。就是那種「比別的民族優秀」的念頭，深植在一個民族中，膨脹了你們的民族自信心，但因而他們太常把「我們做的任何事怎麼會出錯？」解釋成「我們做的任何事怎麼可能會是錯的？」
這並非自信，而是一種「容許一整個族群的人相信，不論他們說什麼或做什麼，他們都是對的」的危險標誌。
許多信仰團體和許多國家的人們都相信並且長期教導這觀念，因而產生了如此巨大的一種自以為是的心態，使他們對任何其他經驗都「沒什麼感覺」，包括他人蒙受的卑屈苦難。
如果有一件事是「將它從你們形形色色的文化迷思中去除掉，會對你們有益」的話，那就是這個觀念：由於某些神奇的血統因素，你們被造得優於人類的其他民族；你們是優人一等的種族、優人一等的信仰、較好的國家或較高的政治體系、較高尚的途徑或高人一等的方式。
我告訴你：如果有一天你能導致各個不同文化做到這一點，那就是你改變世界的時候了。
「更優秀」（better）這個字是你們的詞彙中最危險的字之一，僅次於「對」（right）這個字。這兩個字是有關連的，因為你們認為自己是「更優秀」，所以你們認為自己是「對」的。然而，我沒有定義哪個種族或文化團體是我挑選的子民，也沒有指定哪條道路才是唯一通達我的道途。我沒有挑出任何國家或宗教來賜予特別的恩寵，也沒有賜予任何性別或種族優越於另一個。
摘自《與神為友》第7章
Yet it is this very teaching of superiority that has caused so much pain in your world. The idea, deeply ingrained in a people, that they are somehow “better” than others may give them an extra measure of confidence, but it also too often translates “how can anything we do go wrong?” into “how can anything we do be wrong?”
This is not self-confidence, but a dangerous brand of hubris that allows an entire population to believe itself to be in the right, no matter what it says or does.
People of many faiths and nations have believed and taught this through the years, producing a righteousness so huge that it desensitized them to any other experience, including the abject suffering of others.
If there is one thing which it would benefit you to remove from your various cultural myths, it is this idea that, by means of some magic ingredient, you have been made better than some other humans; that yours is the superior race, or the superior faith, the better country or the better political system, the higher approach or the higher way.
I tell you this: the day that you cause cultures to do this is the day that you change the world.
The word better is one of the most dangerous words in your vocabulary, exceeded only by the word right. Both are connected, for it is because you think you are better that you think you are right. Yet I have made no ethnic or cultural group My chosen people, and I have made no path to Me the one true path. Neither have I singled out any nation or religion for special favor, nor given any gender or race superiority over another.
