Fr. Seán ÓLaoire

What happens if we don't is that we tend to see the evil in everybody, ignore the evil in ourselves, or the darkness in ourselves, and project it onto other people.

We make war on them, we get angry with them, because every single one of us is born as a narcissist.

Every little infant is a narcissist, and rightly so.

You know, a child is totally self-concerned.

You know, it needs milk from mother.

It needs cuddling.

It needs to hear human voice.

It needs to be warm.

And so we start at the end of the scale, which is pure narcissism.

But we're supposed to move towards, so it's all service to self initially.

And it's proper that it be that.

But then we move gradually into service to others.

Kind of the Mother Teresa, the role of the Mahatma Gandhis, the role of the Buddhas of the world.

So when we don't, we're stuck at the narcissistic level, then we develop jealousies, and it's all based on fear.

I think we're only born with two emotions, fear and love.

And when fear is self-directed, it becomes poor self-esteem, and when it's other-directed, it becomes anger.

When love is self-directed, it becomes good self-esteem.

And when it's other-directed, it becomes compassion.

And all of the virtues and vices are permutations and combinations of these two.

And so I think that the greatest fear a little infant has is not the fear of not being loved,