|
|
Saturday, August 28, 2004
Saturday, August 28, 2004
"They did not realize that the world had now become a picture of what the majority of its individuals had made of their own souls." - Thomas Merton, The Seven Storey Mountain
Add Comment
Read Comments (0 comments)
Friday, August 27, 2004
Friday, August 27, 2004
The terrorism about which we should really be concerned is inner. Our minds are constantly terrorizing us. Our inner dialogue is a greater threat to our peace than Osama bin Laden will ever be. "I'm going to be homeless." "I'm going to get fired." "My parents are going to die." "My child is going to die." "I am stupid." "I will never amount to anything." "I am ugly." "I am going to be alone when I am old." In "The Power of Now," Eckhart Tolle wrote that, "to be unable to stop thinking is a terrible affliction." To be unable to stop terrorizing ourselves with our thoughts is even worse.
Does anyone doubt that the collective inner anxiety is the real source of external terror? We are all afraid. We are all scared at a deep level. When we collectively realize that we inflict this fear on one another, by participating in a culture that is competitive rather than cooperative, that puts individual celebrities on pedestals as if the rest of the world are a bunch of losers, and that is all too willing to leave people behind if they can't catch up - only then will real world peace be achievable.
In the meantime, we can achieve inner peace. We can refuse, just for today, to terrorize ourselves with frightening, punishing thoughts. We can refuse to play the movie that predicts a disaster in our lives. And we can refuse to watch it even if it decides to play itself. We can refuse the gloom. You deserve better. You have struggled enough. You have criticized yourself enough. You have frightened yourself enough. Your reward has come due. If your life is going to fall apart - if you are going to be homeless - no sense not being happy along the way.
Start your own homeland security department today - in the homeland of your soul.
Add Comment
Read Comments (0 comments)
Thursday, August 26, 2004
Thursday, August 26, 2004
Scientists have discovered an earth-like planet a mere 50 light years away. It is a humbling notion, the thought that there are other earths out there, perhaps with other people on them. Imagine if the entire cosmos does not revolve around us, as we seem to think. Imagine if there are other nations that we cannot control. Imagine if Christianity is not the predominant religion of the universe. Imagine if there are a trillion different ways that creatures worship God. A quadrillion different Bibles. Imagine if Left and Right do not define the whole specturm of God's infinite imagination. We are so full of ourselves that we figure we must fill up the whole of God's time and effort - that we are a full-time job for God. How puny are our imaginations. How limited our horizon.
We have lost our sense of awe. We think we can control everything, change anything we want, bend earth and sky and atom to fit our every need. The native Americans stood in awe of the wind and the water and the wood and all that lives here. Is the invention of the automobile, telephone and computer so magnificent that the infinite reach of the stars is no longer awesome to us? How little we look at the sky anymore. What a metaphor! Are we more taken with our own creations than with God's?
Add Comment
Read Comments (0 comments)
Wednesday, August 25, 2004
Wednesday, Augsut 25, 2004
Saw a great little sticker last night - it said, "I think, therefore I am dangerous." Dangerous to the system. Dangerous to the establishment. But those who think - really think - instead of "secret cliches," as Thomas Merton so brilliantly put it, are the great hope of the world, and so, to humanity, they are not dangerous at all. On the contrary, they are our safety.
Why is it that people are so afraid to think? Well because to think means to live in doubt and inquiry and uncertainty. Sometimes for years. We have been taught that this is weak. We have been taught that we should have a ready answer for everything - that we should be confident and clear all the time. So we adopt the ready-made answers of those who teach us these things, instead of lingering in our own contemplation. We, as one friend of mine put it, "mistake certainty for knowledge."
This is what is dangerous.
Add Comment
Read Comments (0 comments)
Tuesday, August 24, 2004
Tuesday, August 24, 2004
Every once in a while, when I am worried about something, when my mind goes into over-drive and deep into its anxiety routine, which it knows so well - like a house it has lived in for a lifetime - like a task it has performed over and over again for decades - every once in a while when it goes back there to do that I say to myself, "I could stop this right now. I could just stop worrying. I could just refuse to be anxious over this. I could just decide to be carefree right now." It is a gesture of kindness toward myself that so few of us allow ourselves. Somehwhere along the line we have been taught that to worry is our duty - that not to worry is irresponsible - that we will never amount to anything if we do not worry about everything. What a cruel notion. From time to time I reject this notion and I find I am always much the lighter for it. I think I shall reject it more often.
Add Comment
Read Comments (0 comments)
Monday, August 23, 2004
Monday, August 23, 2004
Why should we have any less an opportunity to create revolution than Thomas Jefferson did? It is not as if there is no longer a need. It is dangerous to believe that he and Washington and John Quincy Adams and the rest have done all of the heavy lifting of transformation and that there is nothing left for us to do in this day and age than preserve their vision. We have a right to build our own vision - yea a responsibility. We have a right to revel in the prospect of improving on what they did - of standing on their shoulders and seeing a farther shore than ever they could. We to have a birthright to believe we can create the world anew, and to do it. I should think they must be turning over in their graves to think that no one has attempted anything as revolutionary as they in the 225 years since they lived. What was so remarkable about them was not simply what they created, but that they created, and they they believed they could create on the scale that they did. Their essence is not in the new Constitution they created, but in the creation of new Constitiutions. New rules. New paradigms. If we dare not rise to that same level then our Constitution is not worth the paper it is printed on. If they could bring democracy to a world that had none of it, cannot we bring peace, an end to hunger, and an end to violence? Is that not the noblest, purest, most visionary extension of democracy? If they revolutionized their world cannot we revolutionize ours? Is that any more audacious than what they sought to do in 1776? No, I say, and we ought to get to it. That would be real patriotism. We cannot forever rest on the laurels of their accomplishments and somehow call them our own. We must build our own achievements, and they ought to be every bit as magnificent as theirs.
Add Comment
Read Comments (0 comments)
Sunday, August 22, 2004
Sunday, August 22, 2004
I wonder if the 8,219 people who will die agian today of AIDS have any interest in the Olympics. In a time when our brothers and sisters are dying in abject horror of diseases - AIDS, diptheria, whooping cough, dehydration, you name it - for which we have well-established treatments which are simply unavailable to them, it seems to me that the true measure of human accomplishment ought to be how quickly we can come to their aid, not how quickly we can swim to a wall.
Some may call this cynical or downright negative. Don't get me wrong. I am all for a balance, and I love the Olympics. I would be tickled if we were measuring our physical speed at the same time we were rushing to the aid of those in poverty dying needlessly of these diseases - the lost people. My problem is that we are not. We are wallowing in our physical accomplishments while we do absolutely nothing about the lost people. In that sense, we are not running toward them, we are running away from them.
Add Comment
Read Comments (0 comments)
Saturday, August 21, 2004
It is far more patriotic to put a Bush-Cheney bumper sticker on your car than it is not to vote at all. When extremists on the Right call it unpatriotic to criticize the President during a time of war, those on the left recoil, as well they should. But I wonder if the Left does not share some of the arrogance and intolerance of the extremists on the Right. Is it not true that we feel hatred for those who would even consider voting for the Bush-Cheney ticket? Do we not "know" that they are wrong? Do we not, at times, consider a Bush-Cheney bumper sticker un-American? As un-American as those on the Right characterize our protest of the war?
These are the observations we must be willing to consider in order to achieve true peace, and a true transformation of society.
Add Comment
Read Comments (0 comments)
ARCHIVES
09/28/2003 - 10/05/2003 10/12/2003 - 10/19/2003 10/19/2003 - 10/26/2003 10/26/2003 - 11/02/2003 11/02/2003 - 11/09/2003 11/09/2003 - 11/16/2003 11/16/2003 - 11/23/2003 11/23/2003 - 11/30/2003 11/30/2003 - 12/07/2003 12/07/2003 - 12/14/2003 12/14/2003 - 12/21/2003 12/21/2003 - 12/28/2003 12/28/2003 - 01/04/2004 01/04/2004 - 01/11/2004 01/11/2004 - 01/18/2004 01/18/2004 - 01/25/2004 01/25/2004 - 02/01/2004 02/01/2004 - 02/08/2004 02/08/2004 - 02/15/2004 02/15/2004 - 02/22/2004 02/22/2004 - 02/29/2004 02/29/2004 - 03/07/2004 03/07/2004 - 03/14/2004 03/14/2004 - 03/21/2004 03/21/2004 - 03/28/2004 03/28/2004 - 04/04/2004 04/04/2004 - 04/11/2004 04/11/2004 - 04/18/2004 04/18/2004 - 04/25/2004 04/25/2004 - 05/02/2004 05/02/2004 - 05/09/2004 05/09/2004 - 05/16/2004 05/16/2004 - 05/23/2004 05/23/2004 - 05/30/2004 05/30/2004 - 06/06/2004 06/06/2004 - 06/13/2004 06/13/2004 - 06/20/2004 06/20/2004 - 06/27/2004 06/27/2004 - 07/04/2004 07/04/2004 - 07/11/2004 07/11/2004 - 07/18/2004 07/18/2004 - 07/25/2004 07/25/2004 - 08/01/2004 08/01/2004 - 08/08/2004 08/08/2004 - 08/15/2004 08/15/2004 - 08/22/2004 08/22/2004 - 08/29/2004 08/29/2004 - 09/05/2004 09/05/2004 - 09/12/2004 09/12/2004 - 09/19/2004 09/19/2004 - 09/26/2004 09/26/2004 - 10/03/2004 10/03/2004 - 10/10/2004 10/10/2004 - 10/17/2004 10/17/2004 - 10/24/2004 10/24/2004 - 10/31/2004 10/31/2004 - 11/07/2004 11/07/2004 - 11/14/2004 11/14/2004 - 11/21/2004 11/21/2004 - 11/28/2004 11/28/2004 - 12/05/2004 12/05/2004 - 12/12/2004 12/12/2004 - 12/19/2004 12/19/2004 - 12/26/2004 12/26/2004 - 01/02/2005 01/02/2005 - 01/09/2005 01/09/2005 - 01/16/2005 01/16/2005 - 01/23/2005 01/23/2005 - 01/30/2005 01/30/2005 - 02/06/2005 02/06/2005 - 02/13/2005 02/13/2005 - 02/20/2005 02/20/2005 - 02/27/2005 02/27/2005 - 03/06/2005 03/06/2005 - 03/13/2005 03/13/2005 - 03/20/2005 03/20/2005 - 03/27/2005 03/27/2005 - 04/03/2005 04/03/2005 - 04/10/2005 04/10/2005 - 04/17/2005 04/17/2005 - 04/24/2005 04/24/2005 - 05/01/2005 05/01/2005 - 05/08/2005 05/08/2005 - 05/15/2005 05/15/2005 - 05/22/2005 05/22/2005 - 05/29/2005 05/29/2005 - 06/05/2005 06/05/2005 - 06/12/2005 06/12/2005 - 06/19/2005 06/19/2005 - 06/26/2005 07/10/2005 - 07/17/2005 07/17/2005 - 07/24/2005 07/24/2005 - 07/31/2005 07/31/2005 - 08/07/2005 08/07/2005 - 08/14/2005 08/14/2005 - 08/21/2005 08/21/2005 - 08/28/2005 08/28/2005 - 09/04/2005 09/04/2005 - 09/11/2005 09/11/2005 - 09/18/2005 09/18/2005 - 09/25/2005 09/25/2005 - 10/02/2005 10/02/2005 - 10/09/2005 10/09/2005 - 10/16/2005 10/16/2005 - 10/23/2005 10/30/2005 - 11/06/2005 11/06/2005 - 11/13/2005 11/13/2005 - 11/20/2005 11/20/2005 - 11/27/2005 11/27/2005 - 12/04/2005 12/04/2005 - 12/11/2005 12/11/2005 - 12/18/2005 12/18/2005 - 12/25/2005 12/25/2005 - 01/01/2006 01/01/2006 - 01/08/2006 01/08/2006 - 01/15/2006 01/15/2006 - 01/22/2006 01/22/2006 - 01/29/2006 01/29/2006 - 02/05/2006 02/05/2006 - 02/12/2006 02/12/2006 - 02/19/2006 02/19/2006 - 02/26/2006 02/26/2006 - 03/05/2006 03/05/2006 - 03/12/2006 03/12/2006 - 03/19/2006 03/19/2006 - 03/26/2006 03/26/2006 - 04/02/2006 04/02/2006 - 04/09/2006 04/09/2006 - 04/16/2006 04/23/2006 - 04/30/2006 04/30/2006 - 05/07/2006 05/07/2006 - 05/14/2006 05/14/2006 - 05/21/2006 05/21/2006 - 05/28/2006 05/28/2006 - 06/04/2006 06/04/2006 - 06/11/2006 06/25/2006 - 07/02/2006 07/16/2006 - 07/23/2006 07/23/2006 - 07/30/2006 08/06/2006 - 08/13/2006 08/13/2006 - 08/20/2006 09/03/2006 - 09/10/2006 09/10/2006 - 09/17/2006 09/17/2006 - 09/24/2006 10/08/2006 - 10/15/2006 11/05/2006 - 11/12/2006 11/12/2006 - 11/19/2006 12/03/2006 - 12/10/2006 02/04/2007 - 02/11/2007 03/04/2007 - 03/11/2007 03/25/2007 - 04/01/2007 04/15/2007 - 04/22/2007 04/22/2007 - 04/29/2007 04/29/2007 - 05/06/2007 05/13/2007 - 05/20/2007 06/03/2007 - 06/10/2007 06/10/2007 - 06/17/2007 07/08/2007 - 07/15/2007 07/15/2007 - 07/22/2007 07/22/2007 - 07/29/2007 08/05/2007 - 08/12/2007 08/12/2007 - 08/19/2007 08/19/2007 - 08/26/2007 08/26/2007 - 09/02/2007 09/02/2007 - 09/09/2007 09/09/2007 - 09/16/2007 09/30/2007 - 10/07/2007 10/07/2007 - 10/14/2007 10/14/2007 - 10/21/2007 10/28/2007 - 11/04/2007 11/04/2007 - 11/11/2007 11/11/2007 - 11/18/2007 11/18/2007 - 11/25/2007 11/25/2007 - 12/02/2007
|
