Fathers

“I believe that what we become depends on what our fathers teach us at odd moments, when they aren't trying to teach us. We are formed by little scraps of wisdom.”

                                              Umberto Eco, Foucault's Pendulum

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Thank you dad, for the little pieces of wisdom

Dropped along the way

Thank you for teaching me

That laughter is infectious

That it is OK to be silly (Corn and Pop Corn)

That it is important to care

That you need to pay attention to how you are impacting others

That you respect women, for they are equal to men (at the very least)

The importance of faith

The need for accountability

The value of faithfulness

The importance of loving your children, and doing things with them

Thank you for teaching me

How to attach a fly to a lead

How to appreciate the desert

About the beauty of a sunrise

The right way to take care of a yard

How to thread pipe

All the odd, but practical things that go with owning a house

Thank you for showing me

How to offer compassion

How to forgive

How to relax into joy

Thank you for pushing me

Expecting much of me

Guiding me

Supporting me

But most of all

Thank you

For

Loving me!

all that remains

“Love is

The funeral pyre

Where I have laid my living body.

All the false notions of myself

That once caused fear, pain,

Have turned to ash

As I neared God.

What has risen

From the tangled web of thought and sinew

Now shines with jubilation

Through the eyes of angels

And screams from the guts of Infinite existence Itself.

Love is the funeral pyre

Where the heart must lay

Its body.”

― Hafiz, The Gift

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Love what is Sacred

Love each other

Love yourself

Love the earth

Love the children

Love the aged

Just love!

We are called to lose ourselves in love

To be consumed by the fire of the One who is Love

Love changes us

It changes the way we see, everything

We realize that all creation is permeated with God

We have angel eyes

Paul tried to explain it this way

“now see no one from a human point of view”

Do you realize how big that is?

We don’t see people with the same eyes

We look at a person and we don’t see, poor

We don’t see, addict

We don’t see, immigrant

We don’t see, gay, or lesbian or transgender

We don’t we black, or brown

We don’t see male or female

We don’t see conservative or liberal

We see

A child of God.  Valuable, precious, loved, accepted

Child of God

Child of God

Child of God

In the fire of the Sacred

All false notions turn to ash

Fear, hate, prejudice, greed, the lust for power

All

And all that remains is love

souls

“You are a little soul carrying about a corpse, as Epictetus used to say.”

― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

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What is real?

Really?

Oh I know

We are deeply in love with the concrete

And oft we can see nothing else

What is in front of us, that we can touch, see, smell

We are obsessed with our bodies

And what they wear

What we put in them

How they smell

How they feel

How they look

We grab hold of concrete things our cars, our homes

We grab hold of titles

And roles

Like drowning people grab hold of

Whatever floats

Whatever is there!

We are like Finn the dog

Who obsessed with his ChuckIt! Ultra Ball

Sees nothing else

But that streak of orange and blue

As it bounces down the road

But what is real

Or rather what is the most real about us

It is our soul

It is our psyche

The divine breath

That makes us who we are

Sacred Children

Teilhard de Chardin had it right

We are not human beings having a spiritual experience.

We are spiritual beings having a human experience

So why do we spend so little time on our souls

Why do we spend so little time nurture what is most real about us?

If I am honest, even I, as a person who is supposed to be

All about the spiritual, spends way too little time on my soul

Mind you!

The Sacred does not need a lot of help

But the Sacred does need watchfulness

Openness

Willingness

And yes time

And the soul needs to be nurture

So that it may be strong

Strong enough

To carry this corpse around

well

Sanity

“The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.”

                                              Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

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It strikes me

As I walk the dirt roads

In this charmed valley 4000 feet up

And miles from anywhere

that we humans are pretty clueless, dare I say insane?

people struggling with addiction have a pretty simple definition of insane

“Insanity is continuing to do what you are doing, and expecting a different result”

I think the majority of people fall into that destructive loop

Doubling down on dysfunction

Making it worse and worse

We can see from history that responding to violence with violence

Begets more violence

But we still promote violence (war) as a solution to problems

We can see from the research that more guns equal more death

And that people in houses with guns are more likely to die of a gunshot

Than are people in houses without guns (kept for safety)

But we continue to insist that guns keep us safe

We have profound evidence that our climate is changing

and that much of the change is caused by humans

yet many (for reasons that make no sense) continue to insist it can’t be true

We have millions who following the lead

Of the one who would be king, think

Neglecting the poor

Pampering the rich

Imprisoning kids

Oppressing minorities

Will somehow make for a great America

Even though history has shown that the downfall of every great nation

Has its genesis in injustice, inequity, and oppression

It almost seems as if the “majority” is the ranks of the insane

The normal are not detectably sane

It seems we may be addicted to the worst parts of ourselves

Yet we all go around playing “sane”

Smiling and saying we are “fine”

(Fucked up, insecure, neurotic and emotional)

How do we find sanity in insane places?

How do we keep from being sucked into the vortex

How we keep from being spun about by the gyre

As it whirls, ever widening until the “center cannot hold” (Yeats)

And our hearts, our lives, our world explodes?

Perhaps the only escape is inward

Down into the deep regions of our being

Where we are who we truly are

And where sacred dwells

Unnoticed, neglected,

Lurking in the dark

Waiting for us to return

Perhaps sanity is only found when

We become intimate, bound together closely in love

With ourselves

And become intimate, as intimate as with a lover

With the Sacred

Perhaps in that intimacy

Sanity is to be found

And perhaps in finding a fragile sanity

In this insane place we call the world

We can find our voices

Our hearts

Our compassion

Our generosity

Perhaps then we can spit into the wind

Shout into the chaos

And insanely believe

Along with Buddha, and Jesus, and Gandhi,

And Martin Luther King Jr

Crazy people all,

We can make a difference

Ethics, are not out of date

“If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it.”

                                              Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

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Some would say

We live in a post fact, post truth world

Some would say we live in a post moral world

A place without ethics

Perhaps the world is what we make it

If one holds fast to the truth

If one intends to do right

Does one not create, at least within their own soul

A place where truth and goodness still live?

Do they not create a space around them

Where those things are present?

There no doubt that space will be assailed, daily

There is no doubt that many, including Trump, choose not to live

With truth and goodness

But can I for all my ranting

Change one word, on policy, one behavior of DJT?

No!

But I can change my words, my values, my behaviors

Jesus often said strange things

Like

The kingdom of God is near

The kingdom of God is in you

Quite a word, Kingdom. 

The Greek word used here is basileus, and traditionally it has been translated as “kingdom” 

John S Spong, an Episcopalian Bishop and author

suggests that a more accurate rendering is the word realm. 

As he writes, “A kingdom is a place.  A realm is more of an experience. 

A realm could be an experience of new levels of consciousness, the ability to see beyond the limits of physical vision.” 

So the Realm of God is that space,

that place,

that dimension,

where the Sacred is experienced. 

Where God is present. 

Where the influence of God is felt,

in which the power of God dominates.” 

I may live in world that is post fact

Post truth

Post compassion

Post justice

Post equity

But it is a very real truth

That at some level

To some degree

I have the power to connect with my Sacred DNA

I have the ability to fuse with the Sacred within

And create a space where God dominates

Where truth, and love

Win

To use Biblical imagery

I can be salt, light, yeast

I can change the space around me

Yes,

I can

Yes,

You can

Yes,

We can

Dysfunction

Dysfunction

dys·func·tion

ˌdisˈfəNG(k)SH(ə)n

noun

abnormality or impairment in the function of a specified bodily organ or system.

deviation from the norms of social behavior in a way regarded as bad.

We all know dysfunction

It comes in so many forms

Our bodies get dysfunctional

So do our minds

Our relationships get dysfunctional

So too it seems our morals

Our behaviors

Perhaps even our minds

And dysfunction is contagious

Gabor Mate suggests that much of what we suffer

By way of mental illness and addiction is due to dysfunctional environments

Poverty

Messed up families

Violence

We see it in others

And we see it in ourselves

How patterns form, and are passed down

From generation to generation

Even the ancients understood this

In the Old Testament we find the claim that

“the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children,

to the third and the fourth generation”. (Exodus 34:6-7 = Deuteronomy 5:8-10)

Of course the author suggests this is the act of a retributive God

But we know, it is simply the way it works

We pass on our worst stuff

A girl or boy growing up in an abusive family

Will fall into the pattern, becoming either abused or abusive

Scattered kids (think ADHD) come from scattered households with scattered parents

Who knew?

That there was such a thing as “trickle down dysfunction”

But now we see it more than ever

We see dysfunctional behaviors

Hate, fear mongering, greed, bullying, name calling

Self centeredness, cruelty

Trickling down from those in power

To all of the rest of us

Infecting us

Tainting us

Making us dysfunctional

We see it everywhere

Hate, fear mongering, greed, bullying, name calling

Self centeredness, cruelty

Everywhere

And it is not just “them”

It is “us”

We are being driven

By trickle down dysfunction

Into being our worst selves

Sometimes I look at what I have written

And I am appalled

And many times I end up recanting

Well

Deleting

Delete, delete, delete

But often the damage is already done

What is the antidote to this illness of the soul?

What pulls us out of the swamp, and puts our feet on solid grown

How do we find our better selves

It you believe in prayer, maybe you need to pray

For love, compassion, patience, kindness, self control

For those things the Bible calls the ‘fruits of the Spirit”  (Galatians 5, look it up)

Or perhaps if you are so inclined

It would help to meditate

To find that quiet center

A walk in nature might help

Or a cup of chamomile tea

Maybe you just need to sit snuggled next to someone you love

And watch the sun go down

Trickle-down economics is a tragic myth

Trickle-down dysfunction is a tragic reality

It is time for us to say, “this stops here”

It is time for us to say, “this stops with me”

It is time

Cruelty is cheap

Cruelty is cheap, easy, and rampant.

It’s also chicken-shit

               Brene Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection, p.52

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Cruelty is cheap

It is easy

And it abounds

Even in my chicken coop

Where Cicely, Goldie, and Gwendolyn

Systematically beat up on Gertie

Why?

I have no idea

Just as I have no idea why a person, sitting in the White House

Would find it necessary to pursue policies that are cruel

Tweet things that are cruel

Or why people cheer when our country

Tries to act like a global bully

A tiresome act

What is it about us that causes us to beat up on other

More vulnerable people

We shame the poor

We demonize people who happened to be wired different in terms of sexual preference

We judge those who are addicted

All without even thinking

Frankly my dears

Its chicken-shit

Because where cruelty lives, other things die

Like compassion

Generosity

Love

Oh sure, it feels good for the moment

This gathering together of like souls to beat up on others

We feel big, and powerful

There is indeed a certain satisfaction

And our egos swell

We are the special ones

We are the ones with power

We whites, we “christians”, we Americans, we the wealthy

But it reveals a poverty of soul that is frightening

And what is even more frightening is how,

As we seek to combat cruelty,

We are willing to become cruel ourselves.

We become what we disdain

We become what we resist

We are such strange creatures,

We human beings

I do not have the answers

I do not have them for myself, or you

But this I know

We cannot go into cruelty

If we do

It will not matter if the stock market soars

Or the GNP rises

Or our military is the “greatest”

It will not even matter that we are safer

For cruelty, and all that comes with it

Destroys human beings

And all humans are

Sacred

Children

you are not alone

“Maybe that’s enlightenment enough: to know that there is no final resting place of the mind; no moment of smug clarity. Perhaps wisdom...is realizing how small I am, and unwise, and how far I have yet to go. -Anthony Bourdain”

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There is perhaps

No end to the journey

In this event we call life

There is a journey to be sure

There is a compass point toward which we can move

One faltering step at a time

But there is not point

At which we will ever be able to say

I am there!

If I head west, there is always a west

I am never done, heading west

I may hit barriers, and I may find places where the way is difficult

Even places where the way seems blocked

But there is always more “west”

What is your west?

For me it is love

For me it is being of service to others

Being kind

Making positive difference in this world

I will never be done with those things

Ever

There is always love needed, and love to be given

There are always things that need to be done

There are times when it seems too

As if that ocean, or maintain in front of me blocks my way

As if the hate is too great, the tasks to immense

But still I must follow my compass point, and do what I care about

Even if I can only take one step, on tiny step this day

So my question, each morning, is this

What one things can I do today that will make someone know they are loved

(by God, and others)

What one thing can I do today, to make a difference in this world

It may be something small

Not saying something one Facebook

Or saying something on Facebook

A visit to a lonely person

A phone call of encouragement

A smile

A blog post

A word of praise and hope

What one thing can I do to day

That will take me down the path to love and service?

Where does your path take you

Realize that road stretches on forever, even into eternity

Keep walking

One step at a time

Left foot, right food, left foot breath

And if necessary?

Let someone help you along the way

You are not alone

Anthony Bourdain, rest in peace

Thanks Dad

“I believe that what we become depends on what our fathers teach us at odd moments, when they aren't trying to teach us. We are formed by little scraps of wisdom.”

                                              Umberto Eco, Foucault's Pendulum

_________________________________________________

Thank you dad, for the little pieces of wisdom

Dropped along the way

Thank you for teaching me

That laughter is infectious

That it is OK to be silly (Corn and Pop Corn)

That it is important to care

That you need to pay attention to how you are impacting others

That you respect women, for they are equal to men (at the very least)

The importance of faith

The need for accountability

The value of faithfulness

The importance of loving your children, and doing things with them

Thank you for teaching me

How to attach a fly to a lead

How to appreciate the desert

About the beauty of a sunrise

The right way to take care of a yard

How to thread pipe

All the odd, but practical things that go with owning a house

Thank you for showing me

How to offer compassion

How to forgive

How to relax into joy

Thank you for pushing me

Expecting much of me

Guiding me

Supporting me

But most of all

Thank you

For

Loving me!

make it personal

“If you want to make a difference, the next time you see someone being cruel to another human being, take it personally. Take it personally because it is personal!”

― Brené Brown, I Thought It Was Just Me: Women Reclaiming Power and Courage in a Culture of Shame

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Where does cruelty come from?

Why do we feel a need to diminish and minimize others?

What is it that makes is pretend the immigrant child is a threat?

And the poor person is lazy?

And the addicted person is a moral misfit?

And the mentally ill person is weak?

Can we not see that each child is our child?

That the person struggling to feed his or her children is our neighbor?

That the person wandering in the realm of hungry ghosts (Mate) is our friend?

That the person whose mind is bullying them is our brother, our sister?

We are all children of God

Bound together

No matter what our color

Our creed

Our nation

Our status

We are bound together

Inextricably

Like it, or not

We are all part of the fabric that is the Sacred

How can we stand by, and rationalize in our heads

How can we stand by and without passion or empathy and calmly discuss

Laws, and politics, and economic theories

While people starve, and live in boxes

While children lie on tarps on concrete floors, separated from their parents?

What happens to those children in those warehouse is personal!

What happens to that person struggling with addiction, is personal!

There is no place for dispassionate logic,

No place for disengagement.

That is our parent,

Our brother or sister,

Our child.

The cruelty we see should shred the fabric of our being

Until we cry out in pain

Until we respond

With compassion,

With caring

With outrage

With words

With actions

We should take what is happening personally

Because it is

personal

Bad Priorities

" Go running through the streets

... creating Divine chaos,

Go running through the world

...giving LOVE, giving LOVE. "

                               Hafiz

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What a time

So much hate (me too)

So much anger (me too)

So much graft and greed

So much lust for power

So much abuse of power

So many people sitting back watching it happen

The environment destroyed

Minorities oppressed

Civil rights erode

Protections for workers erode

Protections for consumers removed.

The poor shame

The elderly abandoned

The mentally ill untreated

The addicted thrown away

All for what?

Money?

Power?

Really?

And we are OK with this?

Ah for some divine chaos

To confuse the smug

To afflict the comfortable

(and comfort the afflicted)

As some divine chaos to bring down

Those who in their pride and greed use and abuse

But here is the point

The sticking point

Divine chaos looks like love

Now let’s wrap our minds and hearts

Around that

Judging, Accepting

Until we can received with an open heart,

We are never really giving with an open heart

When we attach judgment to receiving help, we knowingly

Or unknowingly attach judgment to giving help

                                                            Brene Brown

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What is wrong with us?

Why is there so little compassion and generosity?

Why are we so eager to judge and condemn

We seem to have a terminal condition

We seem so eager to shame

We shame people of color (those lazy blacks)

We shame the poor (lazy moochers)

We shame addicts (they choose to use)

We are experts in shame

And we make generosity conditional

Insisting on merit

We create a whole world of throw away people

Where does this come from?

I remember growing up, being taught that one should always be the strong one

The one with the answers

The one who is in a position of giving help

The one who is OK

Or perhaps FINE

But we all know what FINE means don’t we

Fucked up, Insecure, Needy and Emotional (or Egotistical)

Yep

Perhaps this need to be OK in the eyes of the world

The care taker, the answer person, the one who has it together

Is really nothing more than a way of hiding what we know

To be painfully true

That we are just as messed up and needy as everyone else

Perhaps, it is a form of denial

The reality is

That we all need help

We all need compassion, love, forgiveness

And the degree to which we can accept it for ourselves

May determine the degree to which we can offer such things

To others

Jung and Nouwen talk in their work

About the “wounded healer”

They suggest that we address the brokenness of the world

And of those around us

Most effectively through our own brokenness

Through our own hurt and failure

What this suggests to me is that he answer to the pain of the world

Comes from people who are willing to receive and give

And give and receive

That living this life is always a matter of being healed

And being a healer

Being generous, and learning to accept generosity

Being kind, and accepting kinds

Give and receive, receive and give

I regret at times, the difficulty I have receiving, for it closes me off to so much goodness

And it makes it harder for me to let my own goodness out

I hurt for those people in power

Who grasp wealth and power and shame the poor

For I know how powerless and poor they really are

You can see it in their faces

As they stand behind the microphones

You can see it in the masks they wear

And the tweets they send

Perhaps it is time to change the way we think

Perhaps this Oh so America need to be in power, to be right

To be “on top” to be “number one”

Is not healthy

Go with God

It was a beautiful day

The mountains soared snow capped

The grass, luxurious after furious rains

Lilacs bloomed

And perfumed the air

The sun warmed us, the wind cooled us

Friends gathered

And talked of those things friends talk about

Families, and crops

Class reunions and graduations

We gathered on the side of a hill

An urn of ashes before us

Death in the midst of life

But no

For this moment was not about death but about life

Yes

A dear friend was gone

Her question mark of a body stilled

Her mind, confused with dementia, calm

But  she was a child of God

Child of God

Child of God

As we are reminded by John in his first letter

“Behold what love God has lavished on us, that we should be called the children of God, and we are!!”

We are children of God.  And to me that means some very important things

It means that we come from God

It means that as we walk through life, we walk with God

And it means that when we depart this life, we return to God

So death was not present in that moment

On the hill

In the cemetery

Nor was it present a hour later

When a frail body struggled to breathe

And failure

We lay him on the ground

Friends and strangers, and urged him to live

We pounded his chest, and sought to give him air

But his heart did not beat, and his chest did not rise

I held his head gently, staring into open eyes

Fixed and sightless

I held his head to establish an airway, that would not come

I held his head so he would know he was not alone

And whispered the only words I could think of

You are loved

You are loved

You are loved

Child of God

Child of God

Child of God

Go with God

And be not afraid

what is now

“I have always, essentially, been waiting. Waiting to become something else, waiting to be that person I always thought I was on the verge of becoming, waiting for that life I thought I would have. In my head, I was always one step away. In high school, I was biding my time until I could become the college version of myself, the one my mind could see so clearly. In college, the post-college “adult” person was always looming in front of me, smarter, stronger, more organized. Then the married person, then the person I’d become when we have kids. For twenty years, literally, I have waited to become the thin version of myself, because that’s when life will really begin….

And through all that waiting, here I am. My life is passing, day by day, and I am waiting for it to start. I am waiting for that time, that person, that event when my life will finally begin….

But this is what I’m finding, in glimpses and flashes: this is it. This is it, in the best possible way. That thing I’m waiting for, that adventure, that move-score-worthy experience unfolding gracefully. This is it. Normal, daily life ticking by on our streets and sidewalks, in our houses and apartments, in our beds and at our dinner tables, in our dreams and prayers and fights and secrets – this pedestrian life is the most precious thing any of use will ever experience.”

                                                                            Shauna Niequist, Cold Tangerines

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What are you waiting for?

Trump to implement his vision of America

Trump to collapse, to fall?

The Stock market to soar

The Stock market to collapse

What are you waiting for?

Power

Fame

Wealth

Or perhaps more altruistic things

Justice?

Equity?

The Kingdom of God?

The thing is, waiting is a way of denying

Denying the moment

Denying the person, the gift, the beauty

Right in front of you

We get so busy looking we do not see

So busy straining into the future that we are alienated from “now”

We keep chasing the person we think we want to be

And never accept or affirm the person that is

The beautiful disaster

That we are in this moment

I will never be perfect!

I know, it is a shock to me too

I will not do every class well

I will not be liked by everyone who knows me

I will not be deemed handsome or sexy by all

There will be days I alienate people

When I fail

Miserably

I cannot wait to become

Because I already am

This is me

This is what you get

Yes I can work to grow, to improve

I can work to be the best I can be

But I can only work out that salvation in this moment

The challenge for this day

Is to be, in the moment

To rejoice, in the moment

To see, in the moment, the beauty around me

There is a sun out there

A mountain out there

There are trees, and birds

And cows and calves

The world is stuffed with God

Stuffed with beauty

I tis time to quite waiting for what is next

And to grab hold of

And savor

What

Is

Now

we are all humans

“We were all humans until race disconnected us, religion separated us, politics divided us and wealth classified us.”

                                                                            Pravinee Hurbungs

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He’s a human

She’s a human

Wouldn’t you like to be a human too?

It is amazing how often we dehumanize each other

How often we make each other ciphers, zeros,

And how often we rob people of their basic humanity

As we smother them with adjectives and invectives

We allow so many things to marginalize and minimize others

Color

Creed

Ideology

Status

Education

We can make anything an occasion for denigration

I’m in, you’re out

I’m good, you’re bad

I’m blessed, you’re curse

On and on it goes

But in the end there is only this

We are spiritual beings

All bound to the same Spiritual reality

All therefor bound to each other

We may wear different skins

Different clothes

We may use different words

And thing about things in different ways

We may be have’s and have not’s

There may be many things that push as apart

One from the other

But in that separation we deny our essential nature

Which is to be bound together

As the parts of a body

Which is to be connected, all to the same branch

The connecting tissue is spirit/spiritual

The connecting tissue is love

It is what is sacred that makes us human

Homo divinus  (Eckhart Tolle and others)

It what is sacred that draws us back together

Homo Novus  (Osho, Zorba the Buddha Discourses)

It is my intention

(we will see how it goes)

To remember my own humanity

And to remember yours

There is love to be done

“Run my dear, from anything that may not strengthen your precious budding wings.

Run like hell my dear, from anyone likely to put a sharp knife into the sacred,

tender vision of your beautiful heart.”

                                             Hafiz

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There are many thing that can destroy us

Many things that do not support life

We sink our roots deeply

Into what does not nourish

16 years ago I planted three sets of clump birches

One set was planted in imported top soil

The other in one of the few spots with some soil

And the other, into the sandy gravel that covers the space I call home

One set is intact, three beautiful trees, clumped together, soaring 30 feet into the air

Of one set only one remains, finally beginning to flourish, but still small

And one set is dead

It took those trees 12 years to die, a slow death

No amount of nourishment, no number of fertilizer spikes could save them

For their roots were sunk in poverty

Let’s hear it for good soil!

For those people who make us flourish

For those thoughts that expand our soul

For those activities that exercise our physical and spiritual hearts

Let’s hear it for generosity, compassion, forgiveness, acceptance, and love

And let us be aware of that soil that does not feed us

But instead, robs us of nutriments

Slowly, secretly erodes our soul

Sometimes looking, at first

As if it will support life

Watch out for those who would promise us that which is not food

And slowly starve us to death morally and spiritually

Watch out for the gravelly soil of lies, and hate

Prejudice and greed

Misused power

Underused love

It is almost invisible

This wasting away

But the signs are there

When we are angrier than we should be

When we can listen to lies, and justify them

When we can look upon in justice, and rationalize it

When we can see that people are being left behind,

Without food, clothing, shelter, healthcare

And because we ourselves are not affected , just walk away

The signs are there

Help us, O Sacred One

To sink our roots deep into the good soil

Help us to find the wellspring of living water

Help us to flourish

Blessing our little hearts

And make them less small

There is love to be done

There are people who need to rest

In the shade of our compassion and caring

winning and sinning

“Conquer the angry one by not getting angry; conquer the wicked by goodness; conquer the stingy by generosity, and the liar by speaking the truth.

[Verse 223]” ― Gautama Buddha, The Dhammapada

Do not over come evil with evil, but overcome evil with good.

Paul the Apostle

But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also. If someone takes your coat, do not withhold your shirt from them. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you.  If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do that. And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, expecting to be repaid in full. But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. 36 Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

Jesus

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It is not as though I can do it

But there is a higher path for us to take

We tend to repay in kind

Anger for anger

Hate for hate

Cruel act with cruel act

Whatever it is that causes us dis-ease

We believe the solution is to jump in with both feet

Right into the middle of the swamp

If I am surrounded by greed the only solution is for me to become greedy myself

To hug to myself all the resources I can

After all, if I don’t, those who will

Will win

Win

Ah, there is that word

Sounds a lot like Sin

And there is probably a reason

Logic tells us this is indeed how it should work

We should respond to power with more power

We should overcome

Overwhelm

And if people get hurt?

Well, they should have thought about that in the first place

But then along comes Jesus, and (I suspect) his friends Buddha and Paul

(there’s a joke in there someplace, Jesus and Buddha and Paul walk into a bar)

And tell us we have it all wrong

They tell us that answers which involve placing ourselves “over

Are really not what it takes

To change the world

To make it safe

That such responses do not the “Kingdom of God” make

What kinds of strategies work in the Kingdom (in the place where Sacred “rules”)?

Generosity

Genuine sorrow for the wounds of others

A willingness to stand alongside the poor, and hungry, and homeless

An ability to include those others would reject

And the strength to be excluded oneself, for the sake of love

It is time, my friends to stop winning

It is time to say “no” to cruel people in high places

No matter what they promise us

No matter, at some level, what benefits the create

(for those benefits will come at a terrible cost to our souls, as individuals and as a nation)

It is time to stop winning

Because it looks way to much like sinning

self-absorption kills

“Self-absorption in all its forms kills empathy, let alone compassion. When we focus on ourselves, our world contracts as our problems and preoccupations loom large. But when we focus on others, our world expands. Our own problems drift to the periphery of the mind and so seem smaller, and we increase our capacity for connection - or compassionate action.”

                Daniel Goleman, Social Intelligence

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We all want safety

Its OK

We all want comfort, even affluence

We all want influence and power

Not a problem

Unless

Unless what we want causes our world to contract

To narrow down until we cannot see past ourselves

And cannot see past this moment, this place

And then our natural desires become unnatural

There comes a point

Where we become willing to do all manner of evil

Just to get what we want

Our desire for wealth becomes so strong,

And our focus so narrow

That we forget

We forget the earth

We forget other people

We forget the poor, the ill, the elderly

The stock market soars!

Trump is God!

But in our selfishness

The cost exacted for that success is terrible.

The poor are neglected

The earth is abused

We have sold our souls for short term gain

And we have created long term pain

We have pushed out way down the path to

Whatever sordid goal we have created

But have pushed some aside,

Used others

And simply trodden on others

How long will we accept this essential selfishness

Sold to us by those for whom money is more important than people

How long?

How long>

How long?

O Lord, how long shall the wicked,

how long shall the wicked exult?

They pour out their arrogant words; all the evildoers boast.

They crush your people, O Lord, and afflict your heritage.

They kill the widow and the stranger, they murder the orphan,

and they say, “The Lord does not see  (Psalm 94)

Since the beginning

It has been clear, that we must all get where we are going

Together

The way of the Sacred is not a way where the strong enjoy their strength

And neglect “the little ones” (children) and “the least of these”  (the vulnerable)

Privilege is an opportunity for service

Not an opportunity for abuse

“You shall not wrong or oppress a resident alien,

for you were aliens in the land of Egypt.

You shall not abuse any widow or orphan...

If you do abuse them, when they cry out to me, I will surely heed their cry” (Ex 22:21-23).

Women

Children, especially immigrant children

The poor

Minorities

The LGBTQI community

Those suffering from mental illness

The elderly

The addicted

These little ones have a special place in the heart of God

And if we succeed

In becoming rich

In creating radical safety

In becoming the most powerful nation on the earth

But narrow our focus down

And kill our empathy

And erode our compassion

And abandon them…..

We lose

What money can't buy

“Top 15 Things Money Can’t Buy

Time. Happiness. Inner Peace. Integrity. Love. Character. Manners. Health. Respect. Morals. Trust. Patience. Class. Common sense. Dignity.”

                              Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart

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For the love of God!

My old Irish foreman on the JJ ranch use to say

For the love of God slow down

For the love of God speed up

For the love of God check the oil in the tractor

For the love of God

Not bad advice actually

To do what we do for the love of God

In order to live in harmony with Sacred

We have a lot of other options

We can do what we do for love of power

What could go wrong!?

Other than abuse and misuse

Bullying and coercion

We can do what we do for the love of money

Ah yes,

The American way

Nothing is more important than wealth!!!

If the stock market is doing well

Who cares if war looms, the President lies and lies and lies

Who cares if the poor are abandoned,

and minorities are treated with injustice?

The reality money is at the root of most of our dis-ease

Aided by our love of power, which has synergistic relationship with money

Put them together

And it’s a perfect storm

And everything in the storms past is destroyed

The losses are profound

Happiness.

Inner Peace.

Integrity.

Love.

Character.

Manners.

Health.

Respect.

Morals.

Trust.

Patience.

Class.

Common sense.

Dignity.

Money can’t buy love or anything else

But love can bring us into the realm of the Sacred

Love can bind us together

Love can help restore all we have lost

That is why Jesus said two things are important

Love of God

And love of other

Oh, and maybe a third love too!

A healthy (not narcissistic) love of self

So live lives of compassion, joy and hope

Lives of kindness and generosity

Lives of forgiveness

For God’s sake

see God

Presbyterian Bloggers

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When a Dog Runs Up (by Hafiz)

Start seeing everything as God, but keep

it a secret.

Become like the man and woman who are

awestruck and nourished

listening to a golden nightingale sing

in a beautiful foreign language while God,

invisible to most, nests upon its tongue.

Hafiz, who can tell in this world that

when a dog runs up to you wagging its

ecstatic tail, you lean over and whisper in

its ear,

“Beloved, I am so glad you are happy to

see me! Beloved, I am so glad, so very glad

you have come!”

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Start seeing God in everything

In everything

See God in the obvious places

In the mountains that soar

In sunrise an sunset

In flowers breaking through the ground

And reaching gloriously to the sky

In the grace of horses

And the lavish love of dogs

In the beautiful arrogance of cats

See it in the deer bounding over the fence

And in the grass, luxuriant after the rain

See it in beautiful babies

And homely babies

All babies are God

Incarnation now

See God in the saints

In the loving and the kind

In the volunteers

In the rescuers

See God in the generous and

The forgiving

But see the Sacred too in the places where it darkly hides

In humans, for example

Who are not saints, but perhaps, sinners

The addicted

Angry

Greedy

Dishonest

Abusive ones

See God in the bullies

In the corrupt

In the man lying in the ally, wet with his own urine

In the woman emaciated by meth

See God in the hurricane and the tornado

In the flood and

In the parched earth of the drought

Much of the time we will gently whisper the news in the quiet of our hearts

God is here, God is here

And there are times we will

Catch a saint or sinner unawares

And whisper

I am so very glad you are here

I am so very glad you are you

I am so very glad