Sentimental
greeting cards rub me wrong. They seem trite and false. The life I
experienced in Madison Urban Ministry wasn't warm and fuzzy. The
real world is nitty-gritty and not always hopeful.
Dishonest
individuals – members of Congress, business people and even
religious leaders - get rich at the expense of others. They corrupt
the democratic and religious principles we hold dear. As a result,
ordinary people suffer. Globally, our economies are in difficulty.
The environmental crisis threatens our long term existence.1,2,3
Billions of people live in intolerable conditions. Poverty is
widespread. Wars rage throughout the globe. Honest reformers -
politicians, business people and spiritual leaders - fight an uphill
battle to promote justice. “Good guys” finish last. Pietistic
assurances that the world will be a better place if we love each
other, seem to apply only to those who are well off.
This
is a real bind. We crave affirmation and unconditional love. We
yearn for a creation in which the “lion lies down with the lamb.”
Yet, we are stuck in a world where “might makes right” and the
powerful make the rules. Fear, anger, violence and defensiveness
condition the realities of our existence.
Is
there anything that can modify these destructive dynamics? Is there
a deeper form of love that can transform things? I want to say,
“yes.” But I can't prove it. What I have is stories that
resonate within me.
My
mother, twice widowed, raised four of us as a single parent. Ours
wasn't a Brady Bunch family. Mom told me once that she was sorry she
couldn't provide the male guidance I needed when I was young. She
said, “I didn't know how to be both mother and father to you.”
Life didn't go as she wished. She had to be tough and make hard
decisions. Yet she loved us with the fierce tenacity of a mama bear
protecting her cubs. Her love was infused with the coarseness of
real life experience.
My
second father, Jim, demonstrated a loving gentleness that still
amazes me. He was a farmer turned small business owner. He left the
farm because he knew my mom would be unhappy as a farmer's wife. He
was soft spoken and not very assertive. Still, he was a constant
source of support. I remember the winter he fitted our old car with
snow chains so the family could drive through a blizzard to attend my
sister's performance in a college drama. He made this extraordinary
effort because he knew my mom wanted to be there.
Last
winter my little grandson was fascinated by the Christmas tree. He
wanted to touch the pretty lights and decorations. I warned him that
he could be hurt if the tree fell over. Testing me, he reached
for the tree. I shouted, “No Gus!” This scared him. He looked
at me. His face clouded over. His lip quivered, and he burst into
tears. Then he reached up for comfort. Even though my shout had
startled him, he trusted I would keep him safe. My heart nearly
broke as I held him.
Another time Gus was riding with
us as we drove to our local coffee shop. This is the place where he
is smitten by one of the staff. As we drove down the road, we heard
this little voice from the back seat. “Gus love Allie.” He is
so innocent and naïve. Love is just love. It's uncomplicated and
true.
I spent time with my sister, Sue,
as she fought the ravages of cancer. She struggled just to eat and
to walk a few steps. It tore me up seeing her suffering. When I
left her home the last time before she went into hospice, she hugged
me. I could feel her ribs. She was all skin and bone. I gave her a
squeeze, but didn't hug her as I wished I had. I was so filled with
sorrow and love that that was all I could do.
When the Tsunami hit Japan and
wrecked their nuclear reactor, I saw a newspaper photo of an old
woman. She stood in the wreckage of her town wailing in despair as
her body was bombarded by lethal doses of radiation. I anguished for
her as I might for my own mother.
I remember camping on a lake in
northern Minnesota. It was evening. The sunset cast a pink glow in
the sky. The trees, mere silhouettes, reflected in the still water.
All was peaceful and calm. I could have sat there forever.
I saw a baby robin hopping in the
street near the wheels of a car that was stopped at a traffic light.
I raced toward it wanting to sweep it from harms way. The car moved
forward crushing the life out of this innocent creature just short of
my outstretched hands. My heart screamed in anguish.
Once, while hiking on a warm
summer day, I watched a hawk soaring motionless in the clear blue
sky. I stopped, captured by wonder.
Yes, love is real. I experience
it. Love transcends rationality. Love immerses us in existence.
Love imbues us with compassion, the capacity to “suffer with”
others. It leads into valleys of pain and anguish and allows us to
soar on waves of joy and awe. Love overcomes fear, compelling us to
engage in efforts where the odds are stacked against us. Love
connects us in our Humanity. It shifts and broadens our
perspectives.
I am beginning to believe that we
humans are participating in an evolving pattern of the creation, the
growth of consciousness, compassion and love. As we play our part in
this cosmic drama, we may be facing some of the greatest challenges
in the history of our species. Presently, our interactions are
dominated by the fight or flight response. Existence is a zero sum
game with winners and losers. We experience this in our
interpersonal relationships as well as social encounters. These are
all too obvious on the international scene that I characterized at
the beginning of this reflection.
Yet there are signs that things
are moving. We are more in touch with love and compassion. This
allows us to see people, not as adversaries, but as fellow human
beings with the same wants and needs as our own.
A
Restorative Justice movement is emerging within the traditionally
adversary oriented legal profession.4
Trust fund managers are finding that investment policies that
improve the welfare of citizens are more profitable than those which
don't.5
Business leaders are beginning to adopt practices that enrich the
work environment because such businesses are more profitable.6
David Brooks makes a similar claim about the stock marked in an
April 11th
editorial.7
Recent data indicate that nonviolent movements, as evidenced in the
Egyptian
protest uprising in February 2011, are more effective than violent
ones.8
I observed this potential when I
was director of Madison Urban Ministry. We conducted a series of
public Dialogues on divisive community issues, including abortion,
the death penalty, racism and homosexuality. We brought people
together over a meal and told them they were not permitted to argue
the merits of their positions. They were only permitted to tell
personal stories of how they came to them. As we talked, we realized
that our personal experiences had a tremendous affect on our
attitudes and ideas. I recall thinking, “If I had had this
person's experience, I probably would hold her/his position and not
my own.”
I remember conversations on the
planning committee for these events. Two of the members, both
pastors, one a homosexual woman and the other a heterosexual male,
were in strong disagreement. The man believed homosexual lifestyles
were sinful while the woman said that she had found God through her
partner. As we got to know and trust one other, these two were able
to joke about their different beliefs and experiences. Through this
planning process, we began to recognize that our common humanity
bound us together in spite of our differences.
This realization was born out in
another city where a union leader and the head of the local police
force were involved in Dialogue meetings. Following the sessions,
the union planned a protest in which violence was a real possibility.
Prior to the event, the union leader and the police chief came to an
agreement. Because they respected and trusted one another, the
police chief said his people would not carry fire arms; and the union
leader guaranteed that the protest would be nonviolent. The protest
took place with no violence or injuries.
As
we explore this new way of relating, traditional and contemporary
spiritual understandings and practices are important. I'm not
speaking here of theological or dogmatic interpretations of
religious/spiritual traditions. Rather I'm speaking of ways that
ordinary people engage the religious/spiritual/moral dimensions of
their lives. At this level, we are more connected than we care to
admit.9
Strategies
that acknowledge this connectedness can alter community dynamics and
attitudes. Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. understood
this. Gandhi said, “Power
is of two kinds. One is obtained by the fear of punishment and the
other by acts of love. Power based on love is a thousand times more
effective and permanent then the one derived from fear of
punishment.”10
Dr. King put it this way, “I am not interested in power for
power's sake, but I'm interested in power that is moral, that is
right and that is good.”11
I
believe we can engage the difficult issues of our time with greater
effectiveness if we are motivated by love and compassion rather than
fear and distrust. Love and compassion connect us, not only in terms
of 'doing the right thing,' but in our guts. When
I saw the picture of the Japanese woman grieving in the wreckage of
her community, I felt compassion. In some sense I suffered for and
with her. When the baby bird was crushed by the car, I anguished
over this loss of life and innocence.
I
can't prove it, but I believe there is a deep form of love that can
transform our species.
- A member of the selection committee for the 2022 Winter Olympics reported that projected weather temperatures in the 6 potential sites will make the relatively warm temperatures of the Sochi Olympics seem frigid by comparison.
- http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/06/06/scientists-uncover-evidence-of-impending-tipping-point-for-earth/
- Private conversation with trust fund consultant, Keith Johnson.
- See Servant Leadership (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_K._Greenleaf) and How by Dove Seidman (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1142408.How)
- http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/11/opinion/brooks-the-moral-power-of-curiosity.html?_r=0
- http://www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/Buddhism/2000/02/Jesus-And-Buddha-As-Brothers.aspx
