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.

Giving and Recieving Help - even when it's not asked for

Taking the time to help a stranger seems like an easy enough task for most of us, but once the car is in gear and your mind is racing to the next stage of the day's game it's hard to put the brake on, get out of the car and offer assistance. I remember leaving a bank parking lot after using the ATM. There was an elderly man standing next to his car which had the hood up. He had a kind face and I felt ashamed as I pulled into traffic and sped off. I had basic tools and jumper cables. I'd worked on cars out of necessity and probably could have helped him out or at least used my cell phone to call someone that could. I don't know where I was headed in such a hurry, but I do remember the feeling of guilt. I wonder how many people I could help that I don't even see because I'm looking the other way. Studies show that the main reason we don't help each other is the sense of being in a rush. We're so preoccupied that we don't help.


When I'm working on something at home, my attention fully fixed on the project of the moment, and my daughter interrupts my thought for something I feel anger arise. It's taken some practice to realize that it's the same impulse that kept me from helping that man so many years back. Whatever I'm doing is more important than the well being of the other. Or more simply, I'm more important to me.  My own self absorbtion is one of the biggest obstacles to my practice of compassion and ahimsa.

Walking out to my car in the grocery store parking lot one day a woman approached me and asked if I could give her a ride home. She was carrying two boxes of wine, not a light load. The day was colder than she had anticipated and she was recovering from foot surgery. Her foot was hurting much more than she expected from her walk there. I gladly gave her the ride home and enjoyed our brief conversation. I felt so good for days after that experience that I wondered if I shouldn't just don't go around offering more people rides. But she asked for help. I don't think I've ever turned down someone who has asked for help. But as a stubbornly independent person I know that asking for help is not an easy step for most of us. If the man in the parking lot had asked I'm sure I would have stopped instantly. His eyes asked and I knew it, but his ego stopped him from asking. 

It is interesting to note that as debase and flawed as some like to paint the human picture, we find ourselves exceedingly happy when we give of ourselves.  I chide my friends, who like myself, will suffer in isolation when ill instead of asking me or another friend for help.  We cheat ourselves of some much needed comfort and also cheat our companions on this journey of the great euphoric joy of helping out.  Movies that show tremendous personal sacrifice for others are the ones that bring tears, even to the tough guys in the audience.  The nonviolent path is challenging, but it has many rewards. 

Sometimes it's even nice to help someone without asking, maybe even anonymously.  To the anonymous kind souls of the world, namaste.

Asking for and giving help...may we stop struggling with the simple things.

Connections and Fall Out

When one tugs at
a single thing in nature,
he finds it attached to
the rest of the world.

~ John Muir

James Cameron's blockbuster movie, Avatar, reminds us of the subtle connections we have to this planet.  Although the Na'vi are highly idealized, falling easily into the category of Rousseau's Noble Savage, it challenges us to question our version of civilization, technology, science, etc., over the simpler state of existence or have we reached a place where the two can enhance one another.

Starbase - Education that Kills

In other countries children are abducted from their beds and forced to serve in a military.  In our country the child recruiters don't have to go to all that trouble, they have full access to our children at school.  Not only that, but the school provides the Department of Defense with the personal information on our children, unless we fill out a form to "opt-out".  Under the No Child Left Behind (a program that becomes more sinister as we learn the military implications of this program) schools are required to report to Uncle Sam certain demographic information on our kids.  Is your child struggling with math, chemistry, etc.?  Is your child late or absent often?  Is your child from a single parent home or on reduced lunches or from a poor neighborhood?  Uncle Sam wants to know if your child fits any of these markers.  If so your child will become the target of aggressive recruitment.  But now DoD has taken another big step in recruitment strategy.  Rather than go to the schools to recruit, the schools are bringing the kids, K-5, to the military bases under the guise of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education.  Here, your child will be told about all the great career opportunities available in the military (but they won't hear about the realities of war or what these machines they are being allowed to touch and experience do to the children in Iraq and Afghanistan). 

A Call to the Heart

The monthly Fast for Gaza is this Thursday.  Over the last month there have been some positive developments for the people of Gaza, including a letter urging President Obama to pressure Israel to lift the siege, signed by 54 members of congress (thank Oregon's Blumenauer for signing).  Seventy-seven members of the British House of Commons has taken a similar stand.  The world is beginning to take notice.  As long as Hamas doesn't do anything stupid like launching bottle rockets over the wall, I hope that even more of the International community will begin to recognize the dire conditions that these people are facing daily. 

On the anniversary of the brutal attack on Gaza by Israel, 1400 good people, bearing gifts and humanitarian items, from across the globe assembled in Cairo,Egypt for the Gaza Freedom March.  Of that number only 90 were allowed entry into Gaza, while the reamiaining marchers held fasts and vigils in solidarity from Cairo.   Since then I've read numerous accounts of the events there, but few from those that made it inside of Gaza.  Today, on the FOR website, David Hartsough provides that account.  David Hartsough is the director of Peaceworkers and co-founder of Nonviolent Peaceforce. 

Reflection: Somehow, we have to get out of this vicious circle of violence and oppression and counter-violence. All of us -- Israelis, Palestinians, and Americans (whose government supports the Israeli apartheid regime and the war and siege of Gaza) -- must come to understand that security comes NOT through more arms and guns and oppression of others. It can ONLY come by treating all people as children of God, and with respect and dignity as our brothers and sisters. If we -- Israelis, Palestinians, and Americans -- could only understand this, we and the whole world would all be much more secure.

To read the rest of his blog:
http://forpeace.net/blog/david-hartsough/returning-gaza-60-years-later-visiting-same-refugees-my-father-once-knew

If after reading David's story of his visit you feel the urge to take some action, however symbolic, I'd urge you to join the fast, even if you just skip lunch that day.  Visit http://fastforgaza.net/statement#signup
Be sure to tell your friends too, so they might participate and continue to grow awareness of this tragedy. 

Goliath's Last Days

The now ubiquitous peace symbol began as part of the nuclear disarmament movement in 1958.  The symbol itself is a combination of the semaphoric signals for the letters "N" and "D," standing for Nuclear Disarmament.  Yet, here we are more that 50 years later and further from that desired result than ever.  President Obama even received a preemptive Nobel Peace Prize on a promise to disarm our nuclear arsenal, and yet in his budget he's expanding the program.  Many Americans have sacrificed their freedom in order to bring attention to this issue, or to stop the expansion.  And yet the majority of Americans seem to cling to the idea that this arsenal of evil is somehow keeping them safe.