Say Yes

Is anyone here happy with the world as it is?

Do any of you wake up and sing with Louie Armstrong

 

“I see trees of green, red roses too I see them bloom for me and you

And I think to myself what a wonderful world.

 

I see skies of blue and clouds of white The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night

And I think to myself what a wonderful world.

 

The colors of the rainbow so pretty in the sky Are also on the faces of people going by

I see friends shaking hands saying how do you do

They're really saying I love you.

 

I hear babies crying, I watch them grow They'll learn much more than I'll ever know

And I think to myself what a wonderful world Yes I think to myself what a wonderful world.”

 

OK!!!

There are moments!

I’m not a total pessimist!

 

Some mornings are breathtakingly beautiful

Some smiles too

 

Some days I run across random acts of kindness

 

But then again!

Ugh!

 

City streets littered with people without homes

And needles

Mass shootings (day after day)

Right-wing extremists who get more extreme by the moment

Crooked politicians

Ideologically blind voters

Hateful, controlling, arrogant, retributive “christians”

 

This is not new! (of course)

Which is why Jesus said “you must be born again (from above)”

and Paul suggested we must be “renewed” by the “transforming of our minds”

and become “new creatures”

 

Back in 1921 Frank Buchman, a Lutheran, founded the Oxford Group

(Later called “Moral Rearrangement”)

 

This group suggested there are four absolutes

Honesty (is it true or false?)

Unselfishness (How will this affect others?)

Purity (is it right or wrong?)

Love (is it ugly or beautiful?)

 

Absolutely the right questions

 

And yet what we see, in America and elsewhere

Is the abandonment of these absolutes

 

Forget truth.  Lying is now acceptable

So is toxic individualism

So are such morally questionable behaviors such as

hoarding (we even admire the 1%) and oppression (think any red state)

 

And what is the ultimate cost of abandoning the first three absolutes?

The loss of the last

The loss of love

 

Love gets destroyed by lies, and toxic individualism

and destructive behavior

 

and when love dies?

it gets ugly!

 

Oh, precious souls

Today is a new day

Today and every day

This moment and every moment

We have a chance to start again

 

Jesus not only said (in effect) we must start over

But that we can start over

Each morning

Each moment

Each choice

 

We can say “yes” to the Sacred

To truth

To the common good

To what is right

 

We can say yes to LOVE