Missing July but Finding My Way

July almost escaped me entirely without even a single blog post. It's been such a high speed, world traveling month for me that writing has been mostly of the private note-taking variety in hopes that I might sort it all out later and make some sense, or better yet, some use of it all. I attended the International Peace Research Association, IPRA, conference early this month in Sydney Australia. It was my first time in the Southern hemisphere, and my first time mingling in the international peace community. Both firsts were expansive and exhilarating for me.

Elise Boulding was one of the founders of the field of Peace Research and of IPRA. She passed away June 24th after an amazing life brimming with contributions to our understanding of ourselves and how relate with one another. I'd heard of her through many friends and colleagues. She was one of the first financial contributors to Nonviolent Peaceforce, and the inspiration to many of the original founders and supporters. The more I learn of her the more I continue to feel her hand changing my life's trajectory. I'd all but given up on getting a PhD, but when I learned she received hers at age 50, I realized I too might be able to do it. Who knows, I might even finish by age 50. The global reach of her work has further erased borders from my imagination. I hope to work in a global capacity, raising my little wonder girl to see the world as one large home with plenty of room and food for all. Looking at pictures of Elise, her sparkling eyes and warm smile convinced me to dust off the feminist hat and fit it squarely and proudly back on my head. Women and children are key to opening the doors of peace in this world.

As I began to consider various career paths from here, I found myself perusing the classes being offered at Portland State University this Fall. As I scrolled through the Psychology I notice the class, "psychology of women" and I had to wonder why we need to study that and not the "psychology of man", which wasn't listed. It seems to me that it's the abnormal psychology of man that has put us on the brink of extinction. If we could get some better understanding of that psychology we just might be able to save ourselves. I suspect that this class was designed by men for men - feels very Fruedian.

There was no point to that last paragraph, just an amusing aside as I ponder this passing month. I try to find the unifying theory of my lifeline. I still love technology, discovery, science, both social and physical, and I can only wonder at where all these passions will lead me as they churn and swirl around with peace and social justice issues in a world gone mad with war and the suffering it brings. I wonder if humans can learn to enjoy the benefits of technology without destroying each other and the planet in the process. What a terrible shame if we can't. Our entire food system, and likewise our health, has been ruined by the technicians approach to raising crops and animals. Now our food poisons us, millions of animals live in misery without ever seeing the sun or touching grass only to die at the hands of a frustrated and under paid immigrant trying to make his own way in life by taking this dangerous unwanted work. Technology at it's absolute most evil sees its anniversary in a week, the dropping of the first atomic bomb. August 6th, 1945,  America dropped the bomb, instantly killing over 100,000 human beings and slowly killing in excruciating pain another 100,000 in the days following.  If you haven't read John Hersey's account of that terrible event, you must.  That day, 65 years ago, Americans danced and celebrated in the streets. The day the Twin Towers fell in Manhattan, Muslim fundamentalists and others wounded by America's policies and actions abroad, danced and celebrated in the streets. We do unto others as they do unto us, over and over again in a retributive dance of death. And now technology makes it all the easier.   We can watch each other die and dance on YouTube, or get instant messages and Tweets as events unfold for our brothers and sisters.  And it also allows me to sit here and ramble on in this public forum or to say "I'm sorry" for America's horrible sins against humanity.

Each public event I attended in Sydney was started with solemn recognition of the First People of the area, the aboriginal tribe who had once lived on that land.  There was even a public apology from the white community to the aboriginal community for the missing generations, including a march that filled the Harbour Bridge with apologetic people.  The first event was followed by an annual "Sorry Day".  It will take a long time to restore the dignity to the First People just as it will for the First Nations here in America.  We haven't even begun the process of healing in America.  White America has never offered an apology to the African Americans or the First Nations, much less offered any reparation to ease the hardships faced by over a century of subjugation, abuse and treaty violations.  I for one am very sorry and will continue to work for an equal and just world. 

Communication is another key to unlocking the puzzle of peace in this world. I met Birgit Brock-Utne in Sydney. She was friends with Elise and has been a global researcher since the beginning of IPRA. She's studying the relationship between security and language. She's also looking at how histories are being rewritten with the radical changes taking place in South Africa. Language, communication, technology, dignity, respect, indigenous wisdom, equality, women, children...these are the rubrics of change that we must strive to satisfy. Somewhere in this matrix I will find my way. We must learn to bridge the barriers of culture, gender, language in order to build a better world for all our children and their great great grand children. Let's not allow the human race to end with us just because of some abnormal male psychology that we forgot to study before it was too late.

Killing from a Distance

The age of heroes
warriors
brave men
Fades with the parchment their stories are told on

Murder is mechanized
computerized
fun
In graphic color and surround sound war hums a new song

Only that dot blinking
A heart beat
A soul
A glassy eye can not see the tears
Cannot see the young of years

Sit safe in a bunker
while she cries
While he dies
And another dot on your screen goes out

Another dream ends
a nightmare begins
You play unseeing God with joystick in hand
As you spray the blood and brains of one "could-be" terrorist
You seed the ground to sprout a hundred more

You think you're safe
And for now you are
But we are all less safe for what you do
And who you give your dogged obedience to.

Pavlov is dead
Bite the hand
Put down the game of death
And come home.

War is over.

When you understand you cannot help but love

When you understand you cannot help but love. Thicht Naht Hanh

Sometimes I feel as if I'm walking in a wold of blind, deaf and dumb creatures - my fellow humans. At the same time I also recognize that my true nature is identical to theirs in that I'm also just a walking, talking cadaver temporarily gifted with breath and thought. I'm but a speck of dust that for some mystical reason has this amazing opportunity to experience wonderment, love, fear and anger. Each and every one of us is destined to die. What death is and what happens beyond death, or what happened before our birth, no one can say. It is the uncertainty that drives myth. We build enormous stories that place our existence within a larger context, anchoring us to something permanent. But reality pricks our thoughts, constantly reminding us with each passing moment that nothing of our world is permanent.

Many are born to unfortunate circumstance of place (man-made or nature made devastation), time, or with physical limitations or ailments, or preoccupied parents. Many of us will never grow old and many who do will feel pain and sickness as the body decays, eventually forcing them to abandon the shipwreck of a body. Some may never experience the comfort of a warm and loving home while others will have it in spades. Just as we have no control over the place and time of our birth, we also can not choose the time or place of our death and I wonder if this isn't part of what drives our insanity. We try to control the middle portion of our life, that brief wink between two unknowns. In this desperate attempt to find something solid, something not changing, not decaying, not falling in or out of love, but just there, we have caused much damage to the planet and each other.

Contemplation of the nature of our existence melts away the artificial divisions that separate us from each other. Eventually we will all return to dust and mingle again with the Great Mother. Regardless of our political views, our skin color, gender, sexual identity, our intellect, our wealth or poverty, we will all be equal in the end. The addled addict begging for spare change at the train station is no less than the Donald Trumps of the world, just as the obese, video game playing American boy is no less or more than the bone thin, starving babes of Africa. The rapist and the victim, the soldier and pacifist, the mothers that kill their children and those that nurture, we will all share the same coffin called Earth. All that ever remains is the whisper of our actions carried in the breath of those that follow. Did we make a child smile? Have we opened our hearts to those who suffer to ease their pain without questioning the cause. Did you plant seeds of love as you stepped through life, or did you cling too tightly to a false belief of security and permanence?

When the Buddha achieved enlightenment he smiled. Boy, howdy, are we lucky he smiled. That when you understand all there is to understand about the reality of this existence, there is joy, there is love. There can be no more or less. Maybe this is the truest test of knowledge and understanding.

Peace and Christianity

For those of us standing outside the Christian, Jewish and Muslim religions looking in often wonder how these religions claim to speak peace while at the same time they draw boundaries and build walls between themselves, each feeling that they are the chosen ones of God.  I have no doubt that this is why John Lennon wanted us to imagine a world with no religion.  It does simplify the equation.  But the same religions used to bash and genocide indigenous cultures with are the same religions that often inspire the work of peace and justice.  I support my religious siblings who take that vow of peace by peaceful means, working for justice and equality in this world.

The Presbyterian Peace Fellowship is recruiting and hoping to unite Christians in their latest campaign against gun violence.  So many of our youth are embracing violence as the primary conflict resolution method because it's all they know.  This is how our country settles all it's conflicts abroad and the way that Hollywood portrays all of humanity.  There are many alternatives to this violent option and we, Christian, Muslim, Jew, Atheist, Buddhist, Hindu, ALL of us, must set aside our petty differences and work to save our species.  We must engage our natural love of life and help remove the fog of hatred and fear from the eyes of others.  Here's but one initiative you can engage in.

Gun Violence: Heeding God's Call

Friends,

The National Committee of the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship has spent the last six months discerning how to get more deeply involved in the work of preventing gun violence in communities here in the United States. We have made a decision that we would like to partner with a project called “Heeding God’s Call” that started last year in Philadelphia.

Heeding God’s Call is a partnership between urban and suburban churches who band together to ask gun dealers to sign onto an agreement that they will act responsibly. If dealers refuse to do so, the churches organize to use nonviolent direct action to call attention to the irresponsibility of the gun store owners. HGC is interested in expanding into other communities across the country, and is looking for partners like the PPF to do so.

If you would like to get involved with our effort to support and expand the work of Heeding God’s call, please send an email ppfwitness@gmail.com to let us know. We will respond with the information you will need to participate in a conference call on Wednesday night, June 2, at 9:00 Eastern Time.

Rick

 To learn more about the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship here's a nice video to help you meet some of the good Christian Peacemakers in our world.

Movers and Shakers

There are so many things to be afraid of in the this life, but "change" seems to be the one that gets most of us shaking.  I've heard more than one person state that they prefer to deal with the devil they already know than to face the unknown.  Even when change is for the best, we face it reluctantly if at all.  But, for some unfathomable reason when I see change coming my way, I tend to charge into it head first and see it as a window of opportunity for even more change.  Basically, if I'm going to throw my world into a tail spin anyway, I might as well tackle as many changes as I can so that once the dust settles, I'm done for awhile and can rest.  It reminds me of the Buddhist practice of meditating on death.  It is a major event, one of the biggest changes we each have to face, so it seems quite natural to want to practice for that moment so that as the knots of life begin to unravel we can propel ourselves into that change with the aspiration of achieving giant strides toward enlightenment and an auspicious re-birth towards that goal.  My recent life changes may not get me any closer to enlightenment but they do take me closer to my goal of a more nonviolent existence. 

Last month I moved.  But more than just a move from one place to another, it was a move from one way of thinking and living to another.  I have lived alone most of the last five years (with the exception of my daughter) and now I'm living with another adult, a fellow peace and nonviolence advocate, in a house that provides shelter to other activists working toward a world free from war and weapons of mass destruction as they pass through our lovely city of Portland.  We're vegetarian (even the cats), drug and alcohol free and welcoming to new ideas and strategies for building toward that peaceful future.  The house is Whitefeather Peace House, named for the Native American playwright and plowshares activist Larry Cloud-Morgan.  If you're in our area you should keep an eye on the calendar for upcoming events including roundtable discussions, thought provoking films, guest speakers and of course lots of delicious vegetarian potlucks.  Alexa, my daughter, welcomes all other children to visit and participate in our community. 

We strive toward responsible stewardship of this planet and all its creatures, human and otherwise.  To this end I will soon be car free.  Between my bike and mass transit I'm finding creative ways of getting around town.  It helps that I found child care that provides both pick-up and drop-off service, not to mention that my daughter loves her new friends.  I'm also reaping the benefits of alternative transportation including feeling healthier, a strong sense of independence that mingles with feelings of being more connected to the human life and nature around me.  I'm also learning that riding my bike in rush hour traffic provides me an excellent opportunity to practice deeper courage.  I must place a certain level of trust in my fellow humans as they barrel toward downtown at 60 miles per hour on wet foggy mornings while I try to maintain my calm center and stay in the narrow bike lane. 

As the dust settles and routine begins to assert itself, I find myself contemplating impermanence.  The essence of this existence IS change.  To fear change is to fear life itself.  When I think about the movers and shakers in the world of peace and nonviolence I recognize that their acceptance of change and their flexibility in the moment was key to their courage and success.  We have to recognize that change is inevitable, so why not work to ensure that the changes are good for everyone and not just a privileged few.  Whether it's climate change, peak oil, police brutality, nuclear weapons, poverty, war, or any other issue, it will change but it's up to us to make sure that change happens in the right direction.  It's this work that calls me and others dedicated to peace.  I used to wonder what Gandhi's trainings in courage might look like, but I think I'm beginning to see how we can increase our courage simply by embracing change in its every form.  Even in facing the ultimate change, that of death, may we find the courage to hold fast to the truth of nonviolence.


 

The Eighth Adventure in Nonviolence - Animals

This Thursday April 1st from 6-8pm at First Unitarian

Gandhi once commented that "the most violent weapon on earth is the table fork." Thursday night, April 1st, we will explore the connection between nonviolence and animal rights with the help of two guest speakers.

Our first speaker is Chelsea Lincoln, animal activist and amazing vegan chef. She will share some of her journey with us and discuss how nonviolence has played part in her decisions and actions on behalf of the animal world. To see some of her great recipes and beautiful photography visit her blogs, http://flavorvegan.blogspot.com/ and http://animalkindphotoblog.blogspot.com/.

Courtney Scott will share her latest project with us. The War on Animals (http://www.beyond-productions.com/) is a documentary film that chronicles myth vs. fact about the use of animals in industry. It documents the power of industry representatives to control the message about animal suffering and death in medical labs, factory farms, rodeos, racing tracks, circuses, zoos and through animal traders like the “Class B” dealers who buy stolen pet dogs and sell them to labs and veterinary schools. The film also illustrates the many ways activists are working to alleviate the animals’ suffering, including the refuges and sanctuaries that offer a new lease on life to old or disabled farm, lab, zoo and circus animals. The film is in post production - watch for its release this summer!

Where: First Unitarian Church - Daisy Bingham Rm (below Main St. Sanctuary)
1211 SW Main St. PDX
There is a causeway between the two buildings on 12th. At the end take the door on the left, go down the stairs and then to your right.
If you find the door locked, please ring the doorbell labeled Daisy Bingham on the door to the left of the causeway, facing 12th.
When: 6pm - 8pm
Our Adventures are based on Coleman McCarthy’s Class of Nonviolence. Reading materials for each section can be viewed for free at www.salsa.net/peace/conv

Adventures in Nonviolence are part of the peace and nonviolence outreach of Peaceforce Oregon, a local chapter of the US Nonviolent Peaceforce Chapters Association.

There will be light snacks provided.

Fasting for Rachel

Today is the monthly Fast for Gaza. As my stomach begins to rumble this afternoon, my thoughts travel back seven years to the day that an Israeli soldier cold-heartedly ran over Rachel Corrie, ending her short but meaningful life.  This anniversary of her death is even more poignant as her parents are finally getting a hearing in Israel regarding her murder.  Rabbi Brian Walt sat with the Corries in the courtroom and provides us with this heartbreaking report on his blog. 

From his observations I found this short paragraph to be very telling.

There was a lot of tension in the room.  Here was a Palestinian Israeli lawyer cross-examining an Israeli soldier, demonstrating the lack of seriousness of the military investigation for which he along with two others, was responsible.   And this clash was being played out in front of a group of “zarim” foreigners, including the parents of the person whose death was being discussed.  In this little courtroom we were watching the enactment of the complex relationships between Americans and Israel, Israelis and Palestinians, Jews and people of other faiths.

When I break fast tonight I will do so in honor of Rachel and her family. May we all be witness and stand next to them for justice.