SPIRIT IN MATTERS:  Taking a Higher View of Life on Earth

By Dianne Eppler Adams

Vol. 1, No 10 – Nov 21, 2003

GUIDING PRINCIPLES

...Ours is an interconnected, interdependent, sacred world.

...All relationships – personal, communal, national, global – are equal and best approached with fairness, respect, honesty, and compassion.

...Darkness is overcome, not by avoidance, but through shining the light of awareness on it and choosing otherwise.

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FROM THIS VANTAGE POINT...

     Social Change Without Blame

Some of you will recognize this subject as the title of the talk I gave recently, with Juanita Ruth One, to the local Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS) group.  It has become a topic of prime importance to me recently.  You may wonder why?

As I look out at the world (as we all do), I see many things about the way we behave with one another, locally, nationally, globally, that could be better, more humane, more loving.  For many years I felt powerless to do anything. 

With time I have observed the influence that I have (we all have) in my simple daily interactions and now realize I can have a huge influence.  My solo actions multiply as they ripple out through interaction with others.  I feel more personally empowered and aware of the effect that my behavior has on others.  I also have come to realize, and seek to have my actions guided by the fact, that we live in “an interconnected, interdependent, sacred world.”

If I am you and you are me (inclusive thinking), I can no longer blame anyone for the “mess” I see when I look out at the world.  I am no longer a victim of others – corporations, governments, terrorists, or my neighbor.  Clearly that means if I don’t like the way “they” are behaving, it’s up to me to create change.

I realize that all the while, blaming others for what I didn’t like was just another form of powerlessness.  Blaming is what keeps the status quo in place.

I got a vivid lesson of that last winter.  It’s no secret I did not favor the US invasion of Iraq.  While participating in the anti-war rally on January 18, I noticed how the signs people carried were often lettered with Bush-bashing and hateful slogans.  The speakers spewed angry, complaining words about the war-mongering and a dozen other unrelated topics.  It appeared as one big festival of blaming...and victim hood.

Since “what we resist, persists,” it dawned on me that everyone there who was blaming and angry was adding to the energy that was perpetuating the march toward war.

Several weeks later I participated in a prayer vigil on the Capitol grounds.  There I found peace and felt at a deep level I was being a part of the solution and not the problem, demonstrating Gandhi’s admonition, “Be the Peace you wish to see in the world.”

I leave you with the thought -- if you find yourself blaming someone, consider contributing to a solution by turning the spotlight on yourself.  How are you being?  Are you being what you wish to see in the world (Golden Rule)? 

Focus on the positive – what you want to see in the world.  Let what you’re being change what you’re doing and you will change the world!

(Your comments are always welcome at SpiritInMatters@aol.com.)

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“Blaming others for The Mess is a luxury we can no longer afford.  It steals our energy and our already limited time.  ...A key element in halting the Blame Game is to see that we are all beneficiaries as well as victims. Who has not benefited from the creation of the toxic waste dump?  ...Finding the “bad guy” is as simple as looking in the mirror.”

---Sharif Abdullah, in his book “Creating a World that Works for All”

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OPPORTUNITY TO HEAR DIANNE SPEAK…

2004 through Astrological Glasses – The Year Ahead

Tuesday, Dec 16, 7 PM at The Local, 201 King St, 2nd Flr, Old Town Alexandria, VA, free to members, non-members $25. Call (703) 518-8130.

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FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION...

The Quest for Justice – Part 1

By Sam Keen

Spirituality & Health magazine

http://www.spiritualityhealth.com/newsh/items/article/item_4589.html

[Dianne: This 2-part article by one of my favorite writers is quite provocative.]

As any detective knows, when something is missing that should be present, a void where there should be a plenum, it is an important clue. Like the archetypal philosophical detective Socrates, I set out to discover what had happened to justice. Had it disappeared from modern minds, hearts, and conversation? Or merely from the consciousness of New Age pilgrims?

...Far from being optional, the quest for justice is central to a worldly spirituality - as it should be to institutional religion. Otherwise we are left with disengaged religion, Gnostic mysticism, and a godlet dedicated to strengthening the ego's illusions of self-sufficiency.

Considering the escalating poverty, anarchy, violence, and ecological destruction in the contemporary world, I believe the central vocation that will define authentic spirituality in the 21st century will be a new quest for justice.

The Quest for Justice – Part 2

By Sam Keen

Spirituality & Health magazine

http://www.spiritualityhealth.com/newsh/items/article/item_5556.html

… But there may be another way to calculate our future possibilities. The mystical, psychoanalytic, and spiritual traditions insist that hope is born precisely at the moment when it seems least likely. The owl of Minerva takes flight when it is darkest. We heed the call of wisdom only when there is nothing left to do.

… The unifying principle we seek is not to be found in an overarching global organization, a world government, a world religion, or some new spiritual consensus, but in the humus that is the foundation of all human community - the ancient, unfulfilled vision of justice for all.

The Ten Commandments in Alabama

Rev. GRAYLAN S. HAGLER, Senior pastor of Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ and national president of Ministers For Racial, Social and Economic Justice.

As reported by Institute for Public Accuracy, Hagler said today (8/28/03): "The legal controversy around the Ten Commandments monument in Alabama highlights the misuse and abuse of religion in the United States. A monument of this kind is a radically conservative statement that hardly reflects the inclusion and tolerance that we seek to effect in this society....  Furthermore, as a preacher of the Gospel, I am astonished that there is so much passion around a monument, when in fact we ignore religiously what the monument expresses -- 'thou shall not kill,' and yet as a nation we practice capital punishment and invade nations..."

Christian in Name Only - A Clash of Civilizations?

http://www.counterpunch.org/gaffney05222003.html

During the last few years there has been an endless stream of windy rhetoric in U.S. journalism about the so-called "clash of civilizations."  And the tone became much shriller after 911. The clash--we are told--is the inevitable fault-line that runs between us in the civilized West and the fanatical followers of Islam. This is usually the way it is portrayed.

...The argument is dubious, however, because, as I will show, one need not look abroad to Islam to discover the basis for "the clash." There is a crisis, yes. But, in my view, it is not primarily a clash of civilizations. That is secondary. The primary problem can be found right here at home. And it is the continuing impoverishment of our own Judeo-Christian tradition. We in the West have lost contact with our own spiritual origins, which is why we drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.

Backward Christian soldier: An open letter to the Christian General

By Jim Wallis

http://www.sojo.net/index.cfm?action=sojomail.display&issue=102203#2

...General, your theology bears no resemblance to biblical teaching. You utterly confuse the body of Christ with the American nation. The kingdom of God doesn't endorse the principalities and powers of nation-states, armies, and the ideologies of empire; but rather calls them all into question. You even miss the third verse of "Onward Christian Soldiers," which reminds us, "Crowns and thrones may perish, Kingdoms rise and wane, But the Church of Jesus, constant will remain." And let's not misinterpret the famous first verse, "Onward Christian soldiers marching as to war, with the cross of Jesus going on before." The cross, General, not the Special Forces.

Brother Boykin, I believe you are a product of bad theology and church teaching. Why were you never given sound biblical tools to help you discern the shape of your vocation? Why were you never taught in Sunday school about the real meaning of the kingdom of God, and the universality of the body of Christ? And why have you never heard that only peacemaking, not war-making, can be done "in the name of Jesus?"

A Beautiful Website: http://www.picturediscovery.com

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The most powerful thing you can do to change the world is to change your own beliefs about the nature of life, people and reality to something more positive...and begin to act accordingly.

---Shakti Gawain

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