Open House

I’ve spent a great deal of my life wandering around, visiting fascinating places and meeting amazing people. In my travels I’ve gathered up a treasure trove of beautiful experiences, but have never paused long enough anywhere to allow roots to find their way into the earth I’ve stood on.

I have been in Seattle now for exactly two years, during which time I married Pat, we bought a house, and we adopted two cats. Wow! I think I’ve sprung a root or two!!

Although I’ve always loved the idea of “community”, until now it has only been a theory I’ve longed to explore. After being in a small town in Zimbabwe last summer and witnessing the interconnectedness of neighbors, family, and friends, I came home inspired to find ways to reach out in my neighborhood. In the small African village there is a natural dependence on one another that supports strong community bonds. Here we prize our independence to the point of isolation. We have so much and are so busy, we don’t have the time or the apparent need for one another. My Zimbabwean friends find it hard to believe that many Americans don’t even know the names of their neighbors across the street.

Pat and I have made it a point to introduce ourselves to the neighbors on our street and have gotten to know one or two of them fairly well. But, I thought it was time we made more of an effort to develop bonds in our little “village”. So last week I handed out invitations around our block: A Holiday Open House—An opportunity to get to know your neighbors. I baked up a bunch of goodies and mulled some spiced cider, cleaned up the house and lit the candles. Then we sat on our couch and waited...

Suddenly I realized that no one was going to come. What was I thinking? Who would want to go to a complete strangers home during the middle of the busiest season of the year? My heart began to sink as the minutes passed. Just because I was gung-ho about “building community” in our neighborhood, why should I assume anyone else was interested?

But then there was a knock. An older couple that lives two houses down tentatively made their way into our living room. As I poured some cider for them, another knock. Then another. Soon our small home was overflowing with neighbors, drinking cider, eating goodies, meeting, and greeting.

There were rumors of an Olympic rower that lived somewhere in our neighborhood. There were hushed stories of the alleged murder that occurred in the house on the corner over a decade ago. There was debate about bio-diesel cars, and whether or not a tow truck was the best way to pull down the laurel bushes that grow incessantly on our streets. Favorite artists were discussed. Golf tournaments were planned. My Africa photo album made the rounds, while two little boys almost pulled our Christmas tree down.

We soon discovered that we were in the midst of a beautifully diverse community…there is the retired carpenter, the zoologist, the Pearl Harbor survivor, the gardener, the new mom, the grandmother. There are Asian-Americans, African-Americans, Hispanics, Buddhists, Catholics, Atheists, Democrats, Republicans, and Green-Party Hippies. You name it, our little neighborhood has got it! It’s fabulous!!!

Earlier, before everyone had arrived I had nailed a “hamsa” symbol by our door. It is an ancient figure of a hand with an “eye” in the middle of it, once used to ward off the “evil eye”. As I hung it in our entry, I prayed that it would symbolize a hand of blessing on all who entered and exited our home. And as each of our neighbors made their way out, thanking us for giving them the opportunity to gather together and get acquainted, I felt that hand of blessing on each of them, and especially on Pat and I. What a gift it had been for us to see our home full of new faces eager to “build community” with one another. I could practically feel my newly sprouted roots working their way into the earth I stood on.

For the first time in a long time, I have found home.

I pray our home will become known as The Open House to our friends and neighbors. A welcoming place of refuge, peace, comfort, laughter, healing…A place that those who enter and depart from feel blessed.

What's in a name?

I recently received the following comment:

“I am sure you are not aware of this, but calling yourself a "gypsy girl" is very offensive because "gypsy" is the derogatory term for Roma people, of whom there are 14 million citizens in Europe alone. They are not "wanderers" in most countries at this point; they are however desperately in need of the kind of human rights activism you seem to espose.”

Here is my response:

Dear Anonymous,

I appreciate your input.

In fact I have been involved with humanitarian aid in Roma villages in eastern Europe and care very much for this forgotten people group. But my understanding of the term "gypsy" encompasses a multitude of once nomadic cultures from many countries throughout history, not just the Roma.

According to the "Gypsy Lore Society", an academic group focusing on studying the broad history of gypsy culture:

"In their native languages, each of the groups refers to itself by a specific name, but most translate that name as "Gypsy" when speaking English."

It is certainly not considered a racial slur.

In my work I have witnessed first-hand the terrible racism directed towards the Roma people, but did not find that the description "gypsy" was of particular offense. It was instead made known through general attitudes, economic policies, and acts of violence.

In contemporary usage the word "gypsy" is often metaphoric; A poetic reference to a way of life used to describe certain types of music, dance, clothing, and decor. In this sense it has a very positive connotation: artsy, free, bohemian, non-conformist, non-materialistic.

This is the way I have chosen to reference the word. Anyone who knows me even a little, realizes that it would never be my intention to offend any people group. But, if after further research I discover that it is indeed harming the world in some way to use this name on my blog, I will gladly choose another name.

Anybody else have thoughts on this?

Crisis of Compassion

"Of all countries on the continent, South Africa is the one where you will most likely hear the words, hope and transformation. Larger-than-life heroes such as Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela still inspire the nation with the power of grace and reconciliation. AIDS presents a wholly different crisis from the one posed by an entrenched apartheid government. That was a crisis of theology and of justice. This is a crisis of compassion, requiring not a change in laws and government, but of hearts. We can look at the children with stolen futures, at an entire continent whose future hangs in the balance, and ask questions of God. Or we can look at the same problems and realize that these are God's questions to us. Who cares about AIDS in Africa?"

-Philip Yancey, “Finding God in Unexpected Places”

Bush Meets St. Peter

This post is a must read!

Human Rights Day

Today is Human Rights Day. It has been celebrated since December 10th, 1948, when the United Nations first adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This year, in the aftermath of Abu Ghraib and the current reports of secret CIA prisons, the theme is significant:

Torture and Global Efforts to Combat It

Here are some excerpts from UN Secretary General Kofi Annan’s message today:

Fifty-seven years after the Universal Declaration of Human Rights prohibited all forms of torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, torture remains unacceptably common. Recent times have witnessed an especially disturbing trend of countries claiming exceptions to the prohibition on torture based on their own national security perceptions.

Let us be clear: torture can never be an instrument to fight terror, for torture is an instrument of terror.

Humanity faces grave challenges today. The threat of terror is real and immediate. Yet fear of terrorists can never justify adopting their methods. Nor can we be complacent about the broader prevalence of cruel and inhuman punishment, which in so many of our societies disproportionately affects the most vulnerable people: the imprisoned, the politically powerless and the economically deprived. Instead, we must respond to this evil wherever we find it by reaffirming humanity’s most basic values.

Today, on Human Rights Day, let us recommit ourselves to the principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and let us rededicate ourselves to wiping the scourge of torture from the face of the earth.

For an interesting debate on the issue of torture visit NPR.

To take action, please visit Amnesty International.

More Thoughts on Giving vs. Sharing

"Real Change" is a Seattle weekly paper sold by the homeless, focusing on social justice issues. Here is an editorial excerpt by executive director Timothy Harris from the last issue. He's specifically refering to Thanksgiving, but the issue is true of the holidays in general... and of the rest of the year for that matter.

What are we to make of Thanksgiving? For homeless folks there is a vast circuit of turkey, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, and pumpkin pie to be navigated. The mailings and the billboards begin in September. "Your contribution will ensure that no one goes hungry on Thanksgiving Day."

As if that were the problem.

Last week...the House passed a budget proposal that slashed funding for poor people's programs. Medicaid. Food stamps. Support for childcare. Even child support enforcement has been targeted. The legislation was quickly passed, in time to recess for the Thanksgiving holiday.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Since 2001, the number of poor in the United States has grown by 4 million. The number of people without health insurance has grown to over 45 million. Meanwhile, over 50 percent of all 2004 income went to the top fifth of households, with the biggest gains going to the top five percent and one percent.

This is the sort of radical inequality that undermines democracy itself.

Thanksgiving has a lot going for it. But the idea of being thankful needs to genuinely extend to concern for others. Social progress is nothing if not a continual enlargement fo the definition of who matters.

This was the radical message of Jesus Christ that those who have formed a political movement in his name seem to have missed. When we place the least among us first, we realize the kingdom of heaven here on earth.

These are extraordinarily mean times. The shortsighted and ruthless greed that drives national priorities seems to have no limits. It's easy to feel as if there is little to be done, to retreat into private concerns and individual priorities.

We must instead take up the challenge of our times. An authentic Thanksgiving celebration must embrace the issues of what can be done for others. How can we enlarge our definition of community?

Thanksgiving has a become a national celebration of charity. What we need is a holiday to celebrate the idea of justice.


For another profound perspective on the difference between charity and solidarity, check out Christy's post.

Also, Mike's post.

Tagged for Sevens

From Bobbie

Seven Things to Do Before I Die:

1. speak Spanish fluently
2. have a starring role in an amazing film
3. journey through the mountains of Tibet
4. give birth to a child, or adopt one… or both?
5. learn an Irish jig
6. become more of who I really am
7. change the world

Seven Things I Cannot Do:

1. stop making lists
2. make a good pie crust
3. keep a bowling ball out of the gutter
4. a triple pirouette
5. stop eating chocolate
6. keep a dry eye when someone else cries
7. be in the same room with a spider

Seven Things that Attract Me to My Husband [romantic interest, best friend, whomever]:

1. his ocean-colored eyes
2. his laughter
3. the silver in his hair
4. his generous spirit
5. the way he plays his bass
6. how he holds and pets our kitties
7. that he brings me a glass of water every night, and that he gets up and turns the heater on for me in the morning so that it will be warm for me when I crawl out of bed (oops, I guess that makes 8!)

Seven Things I Say Most Often:

1. I can’t believe it’s raining again (still getting used to this pacific northwest weather)
2. what should we have for dessert?
3. …sigh
4. I hate this piece of $%#! computer!
5. ooooh, my little munchkinheads (while gritting my teeth)
6. how’s your body feeling today? (to my pilates clients)
7. I’m so intolerant of intolerant people….hmmm

Seven Books (or series) I Love:

1. Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art – L’Engle
2. The Secret Life of Bees – Kidd
3. Seeking Peace – Arnold
4. Between the Dreaming and the Coming True – Benson
5. Embodied Prayer – Snowber
6. Selected Poems by e. e. cummings
7. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee - Brown

Seven Movies I Would Watch Over and Over Again:

1. The Sound of Music
2. Andy Goldsworthy: Rivers and Tides
3. Ghandi
4. Breakfast Club
5. Hero
6. Casablanca
7. Jackass: The Movie (shhh…don’t tell)

seven bloggers to tag: christy, lisa, idelette, anj, rachelle, sarah, kristin

Giving vs. Sharing

I’ve been thinking a lot about the difference between giving and sharing lately. Especially this time of year when there’s suddenly a lot of talk about giving to the poor…but is there any sharing happening?

Giving has the potential to construct an artificial hierarchy, with the giver superior to the receiver. This kind of power relationship is too often fraught with condescension and pride, easing the giver’s conscience, and demoralizing the receiver. As David Ruis commented at a recent Off the Map conference, giving can be a form of sanitized benevolence, self-focused and exploitive, devoid of any true compassion.

So then what does it mean to share… it requires humility to walk with one another, to give and receive with mutual respect, to appreciate our deep need for one another.

It is the difference between charity and solidarity. Charity is cheap sympathy…Solidarity calls for true sacrifice and commitment.

For me this means I can no longer just hand out food to the homeless without even knowing their names. (In fact a real act of solidarity would be to stay with them on the streets for a day, a week, or more, to experience what life is really like for them…not sure I’m ready for that yet. But I want to get there.) I cannot just send money to Africa, without knowing and loving real people dying of AIDS and malaria and hunger. I cannot mentor a refugee family without embracing my own experiences of oppression and loss. I cannot care for a child of incarcerated parents without making my own heart vulnerable to the inevitable wounding of an angry, hurting soul.

I am compelled to engage in the lives of the people I wish to serve…to enter into their experience and really dwell there; To listen to their stories; To struggle with them in their cause; To sit down and eat at the same table with them; To receive the gifts they have to offer; To learn a little more about life from them.

In sharing, I realize that I am more whole when these—the poor, the disenfranchised, the oppressed—are at my side and that I desperately need them in my life.

As I learn to share, I am discovering that as a Nairobi saying goes…

I am who we are.

Give Us Strength

Abandoned after birth in Natalspruit Hospital in the Gauteng Province of South Africa, his little body was already shutting down. In a country with the highest HIV/AIDS infection rate in the world, his desperate mother was probably very near death herself. Infants born into this suffering develop symptoms rapidly: respiratory infection, liver and spleen enlargement, emaciation, stunted neurological development, and painful skin conditions. As this child’s body wasted away, his head became swollen and a CT scan confirmed that his brain tissue was already shrinking away in response to the disease.

Then the kind and brave women from Lambano Sanctuary found him. They gathered him up and brought him to their home in Johannesburg hoping they could nurse him to health, but knowing that more likely their role would be as comforters as he journeyed to his death. But something called hope grew within him, flashed through the pain in his wide eyes, and refused to let him go. He knew he was loved.

Siphamandla, meaning “give us strength”, responded well to antiretroviral drugs for two years before developing a resistance to them. No one knows how long his body will be able to repress the viral load or what will happen if he has to go on the drugs again. But today this AIDS orphan is fully present and thriving.

When I met Siphamandla this summer—four years old, running across the playground, bounding onto my lap like an overgrown puppy dog—I could see the hope still twinkling in his smiling eyes. His joy, sensitivity, and affection transparently display the greatest needs of our human condition: to live, love, and be loved.

For me this son of Africa embodies the prayer of a people, a continent, a world… Give us strength. May it be my prayer and yours as we continue to seek a cure, to raise awareness, to fight for accessible medication for the poor, to care for the sick, and above all—to love one another.


Thursday, December 1st is World AIDS Day. Wear a red ribbon, say a prayer, tell others, take action!

To learn about Lambano Sanctuary and how you can help, visit:
http://www.lambano.org.za/

Tis the Season to Consume...

How did the season traditionally about Giving become so filled with Consuming?
I was sickened and embarrassed to hear the news stories of greed, violence, and immaturity demonstrated by crazed holiday shoppers on the day after Thanksgiving (a time presumably dedicated to humble gratititude, right?).

Did you know that since 1950 America has consumed more than all people in the history of the world combined? What is happening to us? In a documentary called “Affluenza” aired on PBS consumerism is studied as a cultural disease that is breaking down our mental, spiritual, and emotional lives at a personal and societal level. Sadly, our illness has dramatically eaten away the natural resources of our planet and become a major cause and perpetuator of extreme poverty for the rest of our human family. It is a deadly addiction that is strangling us and destroying our world.

The documentary has recently been expanded in book form, Affluenza: The All Consuming Epidemic by Scott Simon. Here are some excerpts from an insightful book review by Badrinath Rao in “Frontline” an Indian magazine:

"Affluenza, according to the authors, is "a painful, contagious, socially transmitted condition of overload, debt, anxiety, and waste resulting from the dogged pursuit of more". This metaphor of a disease is an apposite characterisation of a malignant condition that is eating into the entrails of America. Americans' insatiable urge to acquire things, whether or not they are necessary, has indeed reached epidemic proportions. It has caused severe social and cultural dislocations and warped the basic values of American society.
Simple though this thesis might seem, it just cannot be overstated for three reasons. First, overspending and overconsumption engender a variety of problems such as social fragmentation, excessive ego-focality, "time famine" and chronic stress, factors that seriously imperil social harmony. Second, hyper consumption in America has deleterious consequences for the rest of the world. For instance, though Americans comprise just 4.7 per cent of the earth's population, they account for 25 per cent of its global warming and greenhouse gas emissions.
THE most corrosive impact of consumerism has been on human relationships. It flourishes by promoting a use-and-throw culture, a culture of planned obsolescence. The authors rightly posit that "attitudes formed in relation to products eventually get transferred to people as well". Just as things are discarded after use, people too are cast off if they lose the capacity to participate in the cycle of consumption. In a consumerist culture, therefore, one's master status is linked exclusively to one's ability to buy.
Another commonly observed aberration that crass consumerism creates is "chronic self-absorption". The unremitting craving for things leaves people with little time and patience to think about others. Hence most Americans are unmindful of the maladies of their society. For instance, how many of them know that "on any given night, at least 750,000 Americans are without shelter, and nearly two million experience homelessness during the course of the year"? Over three million children are abused every year. America has incarcerated over two million of its citizens, the largest number for any nation. "

So at this time of the year what are our alternatives?

Well, according to Adbusters Magazine...just say no! They encouraged a worldwide “No Buy Day” on November 25th, the biggest shopping day of the year, with critical mass events aimed at getting the "stop consuming" message out.

But really, if we must buy, is there such a thing as “ethical consuming”? I think so, and here are some ideas to get you thinking about ways you can buy differently this holiday season…


· Barter for goods and services. You’d be surprised at the number of people who are willing to trade for something you can do or make.

· Offer a skill or hand-made gift instead of store-bought presents to your friends and family this holiday season.

· Buy second-hand. There are plenty of treasures to be found at thrift stores, and your money will not support a corrupt garment industry but usually goes towards a charity instead.

· Buy local. Support small businesses and farms in your community rather than huge corporations that drain money from your community and often practice unethical employment and trade practices.

And my favorite…

· Buy Fair Trade! Increasingly available products labeled with a fair trade certification provide consumers an opportunity to use their purchasing power as a means for social justice. Fair trade products ensure marginalized producers in developing countries receive a fair “living” wage, work in safe conditions, and have equal employment opportunities. What’s more, fair trade products are kind to the earth: environmentally sustainable practices are required in the manufacturing of fair trade certified goods. Check out the following links for resources on where to buy fair trade products…

Global Exchange Fair Trade Store

Ten Thousand Villages

Fair Trade Federation

Equal Exchange

Fair Trade Resource Network

Transfair USA

Co-op America Green Pages

Questions...

"I beg you...to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer..."

-Ranier Maria Rilke

A Motherhood Blessing

I dreaded the idea of yet another boring baby shower, dragging on with endless gift opening, silly games, and a host of labor and delivery horror stories. I had been given the opportunity to create a celebration around the pregnancy of a dear friend, but instead of just focusing on the material needs of the baby to be, I wanted to honor the rite of passage my friend was about to enter into motherhood. It seems that often in our society this incredible moment in the life history of a woman is relegated to the ranks of unpleasant medical procedures. Other cultures seem better able to recognize the beauty and magnitude of this sacred journey and give place and time for reflecting and rejoicing in the traditions surrounding a new birth.

During my search for an “alternative shower” a friend introduced me to the idea of doing a blessing ritual. As I did some more research I found lots of information on the topic, a loose interpretation of a Native American tradition called “the blessing way”. One of the primary intentions of a ritual like this is to nurture and “fill up” the mother-to-be to help prepare her for all that will be required in her new role. There are many creative ways to accomplish this, here is what I chose to do…

A small group of Lesley’s intimate friends gathered in my candlelit home. Each brought with them a handful of flowers that we arranged on my coffee table like an altar, the centerpiece of our evening together. With incense burning and a CD of Native American women’s chants, called “Matriarch”, playing in the background, Lesley arrived and was ushered into her place of honor for the evening.

What followed was a “gift opening” of the most meaningful kind… poems, stories, prayers, songs, and a foot washing were given to Lesley as blessing offerings. We each presented a special bead that had significant meaning to us and strung them together as a labor bracelet for Lesley to wear as a symbolic reminder that she is continuously surrounded by our love and support.

As Lesley expressed some of her fears about birthing and becoming a mother, we each wrote down a single word of prayer regarding those concerns on a strip of ribbon. Grace, Endurance, Dignity, Harmony, Trust, Confidence…the pieces of ribbon were then tied around individual candles. At the end of the evening each of us took one of the candles home with us, promising to light it and remember her concern when we are notified that she is in labor. A large candle with pieces of each of the ribbons tied on it was also given to Lesley so that whenever she looks at it she will remember that we are lifting her up.

We then presented unique coupons we had each decorated expressing our ongoing commitment to Lesley after the birth by offering cooked meals, babysitting, and coffee dates. The evening culminated with the surprise arrival of a henna body artist. This ancient practice has been used in healing rituals and celebrations in many cultures for thousands of years. Beautiful designs were created uniquely for each of us including the masterpiece on Lesley’s belly. The lovely henna stains, which last 10-15 days, were to help us keep the spirit of this special ceremony close to our hearts as we went our separate ways.

Joining in a circle to close the evening, we gave thanks to Mother God for our feminine capacity to nurture and for Lesley’s sacred passage into motherhood. We honored the circular cycles of earth, life, womb, and friendship. We recognized our bonds as sisters and renewed our commitment to Lesley and one another.

As we parted there was a tangible sense that something profound had occurred between us. Somehow in the simple act of setting aside place and time to honor our journey together, we had suddenly stepped on holy ground. This is ground I want to come back to time and time again. So I continue to seek out creative ways to add ritual to my life. Just as my ancient ancestors, I am trying to punctuate my calendar with ceremony and celebration, memorializing both the milestones and the (seemingly) mundane. God can be found in these moments, I have experienced, if I will only pause and recognize her.

Learn more about how to do a "blessing way" here

Let us work together

Lilla Watson, Aboriginal activist, reminds us, “If you have come to help me you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is tied up with mine, then let us work together.”

Homeless eyes

I roll down my window and stuff a small wad of crumpled bills into his weathered hand. Then for an instant my eyes meet his…deep blue pools of regret and desire. The light turns green and I pull away. I feel my chest constrict imprisoning the sob that is trying to escape with my next breath. I’m not sure why I guard my tears so militantly. Maybe it’s because I’m afraid that once the weeping escapes, there will be no end to it. The truth is, an oceanic tide of grief engulfs me when I encounter eyes like his. I grieve for his condition…and for mine. I mourn because of the chasm that exists between us, which for one sacred moment disappears. And all at once I am his mother, his daughter, his sister.

GuluWalk

On October 22nd, I walked a few miles through downtown Seattle on one of the last mild autumn Saturday evenings before the cold rains began. I joined with over 15,000 participants clad in official orange t-shirts in an event called GuluWalk occurring simultaneously in 37 other cities worldwide that day.

Gulu is a large city in northern Uganda where over 50,000 children flock every night, traveling as far as 20 km from surrounding villages, seeking asylum until morning light. They are desperately trying to escape roving militias that have already stolen over 30,000 of their siblings to use as child soldiers and sex slaves in the region’s brutal 20-year civil conflict. The situation has been dubbed “the world’s most neglected humanitarian crisis” and “one of the biggest scandals of our generation,” by U.N. Under-Secretary General of Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland. So as the tangerine river of Guluwalkers poured onto the city sidewalks of the world that night the purpose was simple: awareness, solidarity, action.

The worldwide GuluWalk movement was spurred by 2 Canadians determined to get the message to their community by attempting to come to grips themselves in a small, but significant way with the plight of these young “night commuters”. This past July Adrian Bradbury and Kieran Hayward walked 12.5 km every night into Toronto, Ontario to sleep on the steps of the city hall for four hours before walking home at sunrise in time for work the following day. They succeeded in gaining media attention and began organizing fundraising efforts, such as the walk, to benefit the organizations that are providing shelter, food, and healthcare to the Ugandan children.

I believe it is crucial to our own wholeness to connect emotionally, physically, spiritually, mentally, and financially with the things that are happening in our human family around the globe. For instance, why do we know the names of every US soldier that has been killed, but not one single name of a child that has been stolen, abused, and murdered in Uganda?

At one point during the GuluWalk another participant turned to me and asked if I could imagine how these children must feel as they journey in the darkness. But, quite honestly, as I walked those few short miles in my comfortable clothing and hiking boots, on a balmy evening, through a safe and pleasant cityscape—I simply did not have the capacity to imagine. Terror, loss, hunger, exhaustion…their tender, battered souls have known more suffering in a few short years than I may know in a lifetime. I wish I could somehow carry some of their burden, but for now I will carry their story to help us not forget them. And if you will carry their story too, then as an old Ugandan saying goes, “one by one makes a bundle”, our voices together will begin to move our own hearts and the world.

Please visit: http://www.guluwalk.com/ to learn more about how you can get involved.

True Compassion

"A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies. On the one hand, we are called to play the Good Samaritan on life's roadside, but that will be only an initial act. One day we must come to see that the whole Jericho Road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life's highway. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth."

- Martin Luther King Jr., in his speech "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break the Silence"

Who's saving who?

I grew up in an evangelical Christian church culture that taught me it was my duty to “bring people to the Lord.” This could be accomplished through a variety of inelegant means, including standing on street corners and handing out tracts featuring cartoon figures writhing in hell’s flames with the 5-step salvation plan on the back cover.

In better moments we served the poor in our community, but always with the caveat that our service needed to result in converts. It was their souls we were after, and if that meant filling their bellies first, that was merely a means to an end. I always felt uneasy about that even as an impressionable youth who had barely begun to form my own ideas about things. Now after years of deconstructing my childhood religion and coming to embrace my faith in a different paradigm, I am struck by the self-centeredness of those old attitudes.

As I see it now, being the very love and compassion of Christ by caring for the needy is an end in itself. Christ said we should love our neighbor. It’s that simple. He did not say, “feed your neighbor so you can get him to pray the sinner’s prayer.” And whoever made the assumption that we could “bring” anyone to Christ anyway? Seems a little self-glorifying to me.

In my experience with “Moveable Feast”, a grass-roots homeless feeding program I participate in with Queen Anne United Methodist Church in Seattle, it is quite the opposite. When I go to Pioneer Square to share some hot food with the homeless, it is in fact I who am being “brought to Christ.

For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes
and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you
came to visit me…I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of
these brothers of mine, you did for me. –Matthew 26

I participate in “Moveable Feast” because in the tired, bloodshot eyes and dirty, chapped hands I encounter, I am suddenly face to face and hand to hand with the very Christ. I am humbled by the great honor.

The gift of the poor

“My heart is transformed by the smile of trust given by some people who are terribly fragile and weak. They call forth new energies from me. They seem to break down barriers and bring me a new freedom.
It is the same with the smile of a child: even the hardest heart can't resist. Contact with people who are weak and who are crying out...is one of the most important nourishments in our lives. When we let ourselves be really touched by the gift of their presence, they leave something precious in our hearts.
As long as we remain at the level of "doing" things for people, we tend to stay behind our barriers of superiority. We ought to welcome the gift of the poor with open hands. Jesus says, "What you do for the least of my brothers, you do for me."

-Jean Vanier

Remembering how to fly

I just saw an incredible play called “Flight” by Charlayne Woodard at ACT Theatre in Seattle. Set on a plantation outside Savannah, Georgia in 1858, it is a poignant photograph of a deeply connected African American community dealing with the horrors of slavery through storytelling, song, and dance. Woodard explains, “My people used these tales to teach, to comfort those in mourning, to celebrate births and weddings, and to provide strength and hope in times of tragedy and loss. These tales were passed from generation to generation.”
The play culminates with a story about a group of slaves toiling under a brutal owner who are reminded by an old sage that their ancestors in Mother Africa were once able to fly. The story goes that as they began to believe in the sage’s wise tale their ancient power was restored and one by one they took flight, liberated from their oppressors.
It is an emotionally and spiritually compelling moment and I left the theater wishing I could be that sage…empowering people to remember their wings.

Mourning

I was awoken as usual by the NPR morning news segment on my clock radio, but as I lie there with one foot still in my last dream, I became aware of a haunting voice describing a nightmare that had changed a woman’s life forever. It was a mother telling the story of the day she was informed that her son had been killed in Iraq. The screaming denial, warning the soldiers to stay away from her door. The heaviness that invaded her body so deeply she could not get off the floor. The searing pain that permanently disfigured her heart. Before my eyes were even open, tears seeped through my lashes and rolled onto my pillow.

Today the 2,000th U.S. soldier has lost their life in a war that I believe has broken our nation and our earth. No one even knows how many equally precious Iraqi lives have been taken.
The grieving stays with me throughout the day and into the evening when I join with other mourners in a candlelit vigil, a prayer for peace. Crawling back in bed that night, the tears still seep through my lashes and roll onto my pillow.

Hello world...

Well, here I am with a blog site finally...guess I better think of something important to say.
It's a little presumptuous to think that anyone will have the time or desire to sort through my ramblings, but I'm going to give this a shot anyway. We'll see what happens...