I’m a person who keeps up on the general news. The headlines, full of “terrorist” talk connected to Islam, has conjured the image that terrorists are Islamic, or Muslims who follow Islam.

We know this isn’t true. Terrorists can be of many faiths, or no faith at all. Here in America, non-Islamic terrors are the majority. School shootings, the Boston bombing, and Planned Parenthood attacks are unrelated to Islam. So, I remind myself to repeat the words, “Islamic terrorists,” only when defusing it as a stereotype.

It’s not that I’m against stereotyping. Stereotypes can be helpful to get a point across. They simply our social world. But, stereotypes are full of truths plus lies. When the lies become perpetuated, self-sabotaging behavior takes place. Repeating the lies only amplifies the terror.

On the truth side, when it boils right down to it, most of us know that we can’t rubber-stamp the image of a terrorists onto every Muslim. Most of us will give other people of other faiths the benefit of the doubt. We make efforts to expose the lies and highlight the truths.

But to decrease the terror, we have to do more than try to manage a stereotype. We have to do more than try to love one another. We can’t convert one another.

We need to understand the force behind understanding, not follow old patterns.

Human beings have a habit of labeling, categorizing, and organizing. Check, check, check. This habit often gets us into trouble and produces injustice, bad decisions, and grief. To work our way out of the mess, we must go a step beyond the psychology and history and we must find the answers appropriate to today.

From my own religious upbringing, as a student and practitioner of Christian Science, I’ve learned that applying answers used in the past is not always appropriate. digging our heels in as if some past practice was pure and ideal, leads to pain and confusion.

We have a God of now, of the infinite. This God has already provided the answers we need to resolve questions in our heads and societies. But, we can’t see or hear the answers when our heads are stuck in the past or on some outgrown ideology.

With my “God of now” I went to meet my Muslim neighbors. I began frequenting The Tulip & Rose Café, managed by two Muslims, I’ll call them E and H.

I sat and talked with E and H. We talked about what it’s like to be small business owners and how varied the customers can be. We laughed about how some people put ketchup on everything.

Bad images were being replaced with good images.

Three things I took away:

1. Terror is increased when stereotypes are thrown around nonchalantly or poked into conversations indiscriminately.
2. Terror is decreased when behavior reflects a respect for diversity.
3. Good images were already in place, placed by God, the universal Mind of us all.