a narrow path

“Bigotry seems emboldened. Our politics seems more vulnerable to conspiracy theories and outright fabrication.”

“We’ve seen nationalism distorted into nativism.”

“We’ve seen our discourse degraded by casual cruelty. . . . Argument turns too easily into animosity.”

“It means that bigotry and white supremacy in any form is blasphemy against the American creed, and it means the very identity of our nation depends on passing along civic ideals.”

“Bullying and prejudice in our public life … provides permission for cruelty and bigotry.”

“The only way to pass along civic values is to live up to them.”

                                           George W. Bush 10-19-2017

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What is wrong with us?

We people who for so long lived with at least the pretense of civility?

What has happened to make us a people who practice

Casual cruelty instead of random acts of kindness?

Perhaps it has to do what is at our core

Which what drives us

Perhaps it is a matter of what values we live toward

I do not believe it is that we do not have civic values

As much as that we have chosen values that take us

not into the land of plenty, morally speaking

but into the wasteland

where we now wander

without civility

We have left that place marked by compassion and generosity,

Acceptance and equity

To a place where power and greed roam

And fear and anger devour

And we are left fighting over what scraps

Of hope and love are left

Crying that we ‘want to go back to Egypt’ (or perhaps the 50’s, or 30’s)

and practicing casual cruelty

regressing rather than progressing

we have some choices

We can simply stop, and sit, and wait for the buzzards to gather

We can join the crowd, believing that power and wealth are the answer

And that our first job is to take care of ourselves

And wander along

Leaving all those who are weak, or vulnerable, or different

Lying by the side of the pathway to die

Or we can understand that the Sacred Presence within us

Calls us to leave that crowd

Which feels safe, but is our true danger

And follow that narrow path

Of extreme love

Extreme acceptance

Extreme generosity

Extreme kindness

That narrow path that forces us to travel

Against the flow of our culture

Against our own (or so it seems) self-interests

That foolish path of

Service, even servitude

Even sacrifice

For the truth is

That path

Is the only way out

____________________________

Question for the day

What would be different if we did this?

What would be different for you?

Would you have to think differently about your guns?

Would you have to be willing to accept more taxes, for all, in order to provide health care for all?

Would you have to be willing to accept the potentially scary presence of people much different from yourself in your neighborhood or church?

Would you have to quite hiding behind your rhetoric, and listen to others, and seek to understand?