"All of which gets back to the problem of reconciliation: What are the humanizing effects of culture? Evidently, there are none."

From this New York Times article written by Michael Kimmerman for the "Culture Abroad" series, on the brutal murder of Egyptian-born, Dresden resident Marwa-al-Sherbini. What heartbreak! What horror!

In the photos and memorial posters of her, her beautiful smile is all the more wrenching, knowing how her life ended. On July 1, 2009 "She was stabbed 18 times in a Dresden courtroom, in front of her 3-year-old son, judges and other witnesses, reportedly by the man appealing a fine for having insulted Ms. Sherbini in a park."

She was pregnant. Her husband was stabbed too as he defended her, and when the police arrived (I guess they don't have law enforcement in the court?) they shot him in the leg, thinking he was the attacker.

Kimmelman's article goes on to ask the question -- how, in a city of such restored architectural splendor and artistic and cultural wealth, can such ferocious xenophobia exist?

Although he concludes that there are no humanizing effects of culture, I find this answer too easy and pat.

A walk through the Louvre won't wipe anger from the heart of someone who nurtures and feeds their hatred and suspicion. Hitler was an artist, and was proud of the cultural superiority of the Germans -- look, our glorious culture gave rise to the magnificent Wagner!!

There is no one-step causal relationship between the arts and love of others.

But art IS an expression of a love. Creation of visual art, singing a song, writing a sonnet, working the turntables, is an expression of self, a learning of self, a calling out to the immensity of all that is outside each of us. When we share in art, look at the paintings, hear the music, read the poetry, give ourselves up to the story, we learn something of ourselves, and therefore of others, those who made the art we share, and those we share it with.

It's just not as simple as: surround someone with art, and fear of others and fear of the unknown will melt from their heart.

Life is not so simple.

Art can help us love more, but it must be part of the whole world loving more. Knowing more about other cultures, other religions, other peoples, absorbing the lesson again and again that, hey, no matter our differences, we're all human!; this must happen over and over and over, in school, in work, in practice, in play.

Oh, Marwa al-Sherbini, my heart breaks for you, your husband, your son, your friends. I don't know how it all works, but my God, Allah, oh Jehovah, be with them all. Help them be strengthened by love, help them in this most despairing of times. I cannot fathom the agony!!! My heart breaks.

Help them.

Help them.

Help us love ourselves and each other. Help us all.