Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Provisions for Peace

It seems to me that many of us miss the whole point of Jesus' message. Jesus was a radical who believed that we must obey the civil laws and peacefully protest the ones that deny human equality and justice. Even in the time of Jesus, taxes were collected to provide public services. Where did many get the message that some of us are deserving of privileges and property without payment?

Jesus was a Jew who realized that the chosen people needed to be less judgmental of others and more compassionate for all of creation. Jesus never said that we are to hold any class or caste of people above others. In fact, Jesus purposely ate and socialized with those considered inferior by his Jewish society.

Paul skipped over much of the good about Judaism in order to convert the most people in the least amount of time. We must remember that the early Christians believed that The Rapture was imminent, in their own lifetimes. They believed that it was imperative that all souls be "saved" in their own lifespans. Paul seems to have created "Christianity Light."

All attempts to create mass conversions within certain earthly timetables create nothing but hypocrisy. Many wars have been fought over religious beliefs. These efforts are doomed to failure, as war begets more war. All the "conversions" accomplished under threat of death, whether earthly or eternal, are not true conversions of The Spirit. Fear begets false faith. Until we are touched by The Spirit and take joy in following our faith, we are not truly converted.

While it may be true that there are many who attempt to follow Jesus without the commandments binding the Jews, there are few that succeed in peaceful community without written guidelines to which the community members commit. As a child of parents born to the law and then attempting to raise children in "The Spirit," I have found that there is little peace without the protection of laws.

It is also my experience that few people care to know the rules of their own religions or their own families and neighbors. Is it ignorance or arrogance that allows so many to profess belief in certain sets of rules while exempting themselves from following those rules?

Jews believe that when humans sin against "God," humans may ask forgiveness only from "God."  Jews also believe that any sin committed against a fellow "neighbor" must be petitioned for forgiveness from that "neighbor." Jewish Jesus also taught this message. Do we also have the responsibility to allow ourselves to be vulnerable enough to admit that we were hurt rather than turn our hurt into fear and anger with no attempt at reconciliation?

Shortcuts don't work in the arena of Eternity. We are each responsible for stewardship of the provisions for peace. We must stop acting as if only our own lifetimes matter and begin believing that our mission is to help create peace on our own earth. One generation at a time, we may succeed.


Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Embracing Innocence


The Bible is full of cautionary tales about humans' mistakes made because of humanity's hubris. If one generation kills children, the next generation will fight to avenge the killings. Isn't it time we stop listening to the fear-mongers and realize that it is in our power to turn our own lives back to faith "like that of a child."

Observe  uncorrupted children on the playground. They want everyone to be friends with each other and are simply intrigued by any differences in others. How sad it is that so many children have been robbed of their innocence even before they go to school.


The greatest sadness in my life is watching people "teach" innocent children how to be "tough." I believe that this destroys the spirit. I believe that home and family are meant to be "home base" for compassion, a place to renew our spirits and to rest awhile before again facing the fears of the outside world.

Too often I see older siblings and cousins, parents and other relations "sharing" their "realities" with the innocents in their midst. What is the purpose of this "sharing," other than to create fear in the child, and a sense of awe for the vast knowledge of the one "sharing?" When we foster fear in others, it is a way of becoming the controller of their sense of safety. These people are not protectors; they simply want others to feel powerless in their presence.

I don't believe that the story of Adam and Eve leaving the paradise of innocence is a tale of "God's" wrath. I believe it is a tale of sad resignation that we want to know the unknowable and are willing to give up everything else for a sense of power. We give up our trusting innocence and pass our fears on to others. Only through humility and admitting what we can never know will we ever feel innocent and whole again.


Monday, September 24, 2012

Peaceful Progeny

Honor. What does that mean? One definition says that it is to bring respect to another's beliefs and actions. How does an assassin's child honor his or her parent? How does a drug addict's child honor his or her parent? How would Hitler's progeny pay tribute to his history?

Perhaps we must revisit the Ten Commandments and realize that they were meant for those following the same path. There are many that we want to believe can become blessed that have no ability to become anything more than talking animals.

In my experience, example is everything, and those born without souls can never develop them. There are also many who are born with innocent souls, and have no capacity for freedom of their wills. Those with no souls will never be saved, and those with no judgement must be trained by careful care giving and consistent example.

A sure way to deaden the soul is with mind-altering drugs. How many babies with dead souls have been born to these deadened people? How many wars have been fought with encouragement for the troops to deaden their souls with alcohol and other drugs? When we kill our consciousness, we kill our consciences -- at least temporarily. What we wake to can be so horrific that we can't face the shame, so we do more of the same.

We now have the technology to ascertain those with capacity to make judgments and those who are permanently damaged in this capacity. It is time that we accept that we will never stop violence until we're willing to sacrifice those without functioning souls. Lack of judgement leads to honest mistakes, but lack of a functioning soul leads only to evil.

Those who are willing to procreate should prepare their bodies and souls for conception, and those who will nurture these children must also protect and nurture the parents. This is the only way we can produce progeny better than beasts, and the only way we can hope to create peace upon our earth.

I am a parent of two children. I have never been at peace as long as my children were at war with each other. Can we believe that The Creator of All will ever be at peace as long as we war with others in creation? I don't expect my children to agree on everything, but I do want for them to have respect for each others' places on the path to peace and to protect and guide each others' children on this path. And I expect all our family members to hold each other accountable to certain stated rules of relationship.

If I have stepped outside the rules and refuse to return, it is no dishonor to me for my children to seek a path without me. And I mean no dishonor to them if I feel that they have stepped off the family path that we have all laid out, if I stay my course while they go their own ways.

Saturday, September 22, 2012

Eternal Energy

I know that peace on earth will not happen in my lifetime; it is likely, neither will The Rapture. I believe that we are part of the Eternal Energy that represents "God" on this earth. I also believe that until all of our energy coalesces back into Positive Power, there will be no eternal peace for anyone.

I have relatives and friends who left much destruction in their wakes, but they also left positive energy. I watch subsequent generations touched by them to ascertain their levels of eternal peace. It saddens me greatly when I see their children struggling with the same demons to whom they lost their fights. I have attempted to intervene, and have been sucked into their hells. In grief, I had to finally turn my head and heart away.

What I believe is: If we do what we can to positively direct the energy in our lifetimes, bit by bit and generation by generation, we can make a difference in eternity. When we stop thinking of salvation only in terms of ourselves we will care what happens to the generations that come after us and all of eternal creation.

Friday, September 21, 2012

Breaking the Bonds of Blindness

Until I was almost sixty, I lived in La-La land, believing that all was right in my own home. As long as I could make it home and close the door on the outside world, I could be safe with my babies under my wings. Any perceived threat to the safety of my children, physically or morally, was banished. I wouldn't even watch the news for fear that the outside world would infect my children's innocence.

Several threats of death in family and close friends awakened me. I came home and reconnected with my family and friends in a fully awakened state, believing that I was strong enough to face long-denied truths. All my years of denial had created a type of emotional blindness in me -- sort of like, I suppose, living in a cave would do for one's physical eyes. The truth did not set me free; in fact, it almost killed me and may have killed relationships with several of my friends and my family.

I want so badly to believe that we can achieve peace on earth and that we can break the horrible human cycle of jealousy and competition that began with the first humans that I had convinced myself that this world existed in my family and friends. How horrible it was for me to find out that my family and friends are as flawed as the outside world. What great grief I have experienced coming to understand that not all people are willing or able to break with the patterns inherited from their parents.

Must "Christians" act as "soldiers of Christ" with all the accompanying anger and competitiveness? Can't we simply spread the solace of The Spirit? Can't we share harmony simply -- with a smile, a hug, and a bit of compassion, without being ridiculed and persecuted for our passivity and naivete?

I do have a home with harmony, but it can be lonely at times. Is there such a thing as "emotional cataracts" to help dim the light of outside reality?


Thursday, September 20, 2012

The Price We Pay

I don't know what happened to me when my daughter got so sick;
I felt that my mother's God, on my daughter, had played a trick.
My mother always said that the bad that happened to me
Was because of sins I committed, and that God could see.

I had learned, at an early age, that sins of the parents
Were passed on to the children, who had to do penance.
How was I to undo my children's problems I caused?
I offered myself as penance for breaking God's laws.

But I knew I was not worthy to be human sacrifice;
Only innocent souls would, as scapegoats, suffice.
My children let me know I make their pain worse;
I will left them alone, rather than continue the curse.

I was taught The "Divine Father" of Jesus, the Christ
Demanded that his own son die as a human sacrifice.
How could I believe in scripture and not firmly believe
My sins led to my children's destruction, like those of Eve?

Watching mistakes repeated by my daughter and son,
I could not abide more shame for what I have done.
I wished that they could start over from another womb,
And let my evil be taken with me to my tomb.

There are those who now say that Christianity
Is about how much Jesus and his father love me.
They refuse to admit that, for many generations,
Religion was about redeeming ancestral obligation.

Coming back to my roots and my mother's death
Has put my relationships and shame to the test.
I have struggled to define my own Holy Spirit;
I'm not comfortable, on others, in judgement, to sit.

But there are many behaviors in which I see danger;
My pointing them out seems to cause much anger.
I've have often been told to shut up and go away;
Many people don't want to hear what I have to say.

They have told me so many of their deepest secrets,
I think they, have since then, come to regret.
I have held their hurts, for years, in my heart;
Am I to be silent as, their mistakes, they restart?

Does my responsibility as "my brother's keeper"
Permit me to silently welcome the "grim reaper",
Whether that reaper is the one who perverts souls,
Or the one who finally reclaims the sick and the old?

The Ten Commandments seem such basic laws,
Yet they have, for generations, given pause.
I am so tired of the parsing of details,
Knowing many believers have become derailed.

Forget about what your "god" will forgive;
Save the communities in which we live.
My "God" doesn't want sacrifice of a fatted calf;
My "God" wants communities that share a child's laugh.

My "God" doesn't want great temples of gold;
My "God" wants someone to hold the hands of the old.
My "God" doesn't care about "God's" earthly name.
Nor what happens to our bodily remains.

My "God" wants greed and arrogance to cease,
And for all of creation to live in peace.
It is true that there are many natural deaths,
But death is necessary to growth, nonetheless.

We don't know what will be our earthly contribution;
I choose to believe it's not for ancestral retribution.
Until we teach our children they're born with clean slates,
We will live with the destruction that shame creates.


We cannot gestate an innocent human with a soul,
Inside a mother who has stopped being whole.
And until babies' sweet souls can be gestated in peace,
It's unlikely that killing of bodies and souls will cease.


















Monday, September 17, 2012

Can We Help Create Heaven on Earth?

The truth is that we will never have justice until we rid ourselves of the idea that there are people who are born to rule over others. Too many generations have justified dictators, emperors, slave holders, and all manner of human bondage and abuse by pointing to scriptural passages that indicate that all leadership comes from "God". We must ask what is the example of their "God"?

Is your "God" a jealous, vengeful father, as so many writers of scripture state as their experience? Is your "God" a gentle Jew walking among men and women, spreading responsibility, compassion, and joyful gratitude? Or is your "God" a Spirit of Holiness that imbues all of creation, especially humankind?

I believe that this is why we need scriptures that have been revealed after the enlightenment of Pentecost descended upon the earth. What Christians believed after the resurrection of the body of Jesus has taken almost two thousand years to begin to be realized. We cannot afford to continue separating people into either saints or sinners based on a creed, or humans and non-humans by the color of their skin. We must have a code of conduct that includes all those willing to live with compassion and responsibility for all of creation, especially the children, the aged, the infirm, and the otherwise vulnerable.

We pretend that those born to privilege are endowed with leadership skills.  Good leadership requires self-discipline, patience, and compassion. Truly anointed leaders don't lead by fear, but by example. With the possible exception of those born severely brain damaged, sometimes through gestational drug addiction or other pre-birth injuries, we are all born with some ability to take personal responsibility. We make a mistake believing that there should be a group of "God"-defined masters to guide the less privileged as a shepherd guides his sheep.

I believe that "righteousness" is handed on, one hand held through the valleys of darkness at a time. Creation is in spiritual crisis, no less severe than are communities hit by tsunamis and hurricanes. When a hurricane hits, all the compassionate join hands with each other, and roll up their sleeves to assist. There is no male nor female, no black nor white. Isn't this how heaven has been described? We are then all created equal. We can spread this throughout creation., if we simply work at it.

What I believe we need is mentors, not masters or mistresses. And I believe that many of the journals of these mentors should indeed be included into sacred scripture. Let's ask those who have brought up compassionate, responsible parents to tell us the stories of their faith and families. Maybe we can create a heaven on earth with a Spirit of Holiness reigning over us all.

Saturday, September 15, 2012

Awake and Aware

“It is not good for the man to be alone" -- Genesis 2:18. I believe this means that no human is meant to live completely without other humans. Teenagers seem, like toddlers, to think they are more powerful than they are. Only a strong circle of sober, strong adults can keep them within the bounds of our values.

There is nothing as challenging in life as bringing teenagers into adulthood. In areas where we didn't make it,  it is impossible to lead our children there. This is why children need a network of caring adults, with shared family goals, to help them go through life. Sadly, many children are torn apart by competing, seemingly irreconcilable differences in family values.

I have heard so many parents say that all they want is for their children to be "happy." I have always wanted for my children to be compassionate, responsible citizens. This desire has often kept any of us from feeling "happy" for long periods of time. I have been willing to live with this, but it has been difficult on my marriages and other relationships. When Mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy?

I see as a tragedy that too many of us give up on our children's souls in order to have what we call "peace" in our homes. We figure that if we can't beat our children and the world at keeping our children from spiritual harm, we'll simply enjoy the ease of joining them. We drug ourselves and our children and begin on a slippery slope that can lead to the deaths of our souls. Death is, after all, the ultimate "peace," or is it?

When our souls die, our bodies are actually in agony, constantly hungry, for we know not what. It is for a place of peace inside of ourselves and our circle. But if the circle is broken, where can we go to rest? There are so many children broken beyond repair because they have no safe circle to run to and call, "home."


The greatest sin seems to be those who enter those safe circles pretending to be protectors, when in fact, they are predators and people who want to be our children's playmates instead of partners in parenting. Where can a child go from there, especially when maintenance of the circle becomes more important than the child? Drugged parents are not paying attention. Circles of family and of faith are excellent hunting grounds for "virgin" victims. We must all stay awake and aware. Our time to play is after they move away.


With very strong leadership and consistent boundaries, teenagers can feel safe enough to throw themselves against the walls of our love and know that they will be protected from evil, both inside their own heads and from those outside our circles. The important thing is that we have a strong committed circle in which they can act out their crazies. No amount of drugs can make them feel as secure as faithful family circle can.



I have lost so many to drugs long before their bodies died. The pain of looking into the eyes of a loved one and seeing nothing is almost unbearable. Where does the soul go? It seems into hell because those who seek "happiness" in constant "euphoria," whether through drugs or other forms of blocking the senses can no longer handle anything outside of their own "euphoric" states. Even religious ecstasy is wrong when entered into at the expense of the children in our care.

Heaven (The kingdom of "God") on earth is in the sure, loving eyes and hands of others, never completely in our own heads, hearts, or souls, no matter with whom or how hard we pray.









Thursday, September 13, 2012

Little Boy Joy

As I sat alternately staring at the
Computer screen and the harbor,
I was writing about our sacred Sunday
When the phone disturbed my mind's order.

It was the man of whom I wrote,
Inviting me to join him for lunch.
He didn't say he missed me,
But I had that strong hunch.

He said he'd give me a tour
Of the progress on the boat.
He'd finished a big project,
And he surely wanted  to gloat.

I do enjoy his little boy joy
In things at which he succeeds.
I think that pure joy is something
That our world now sorely needs.

He confessed as we walked to lunch,
That he had been in withdrawals.
Afterglow is an important step
When our hearts and souls are full.

Why are so many, mostly adults,
Reluctant to express elation,.
Except in those areas that
Don't affect their own situations?

Adults seem able to celebrate openly
The scores of their sports team
And the exploits of celebrities.
Joy in their own lives, rarely seen

We hear about failures and crimes.
We hear about the virtues of humility.
What about the celebration
When we are all that we can be?






Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Post-Motherhood Marriage

The Spirit was never enough for humans, no matter what some believe;
If "God" thought "God" was enough, there would have never been Eve.
Each of us spends our lives looking for complementary human touch;
There is nothing on earth that we intrinsically crave so much.

The problem comes in when our innocence has been destroyed
By those who find the needs of others as reason to be annoyed.
Even if these people, long-ago, had their innocence perverted,
This is not a justification to have, human compassion, deserted.

Sometimes we have to strip our lives down to the naked truths;
My husband and have never had fresh soil in which to take root.
When we met, I had children, and was soon to be a grandmother.
We never had a time when we could truly forsake all others.

I guess this phrase in scripture refers to sexual infidelity;
From other commitments, to build a marriage, we must break free.
Those who continue to prioritize their families of origin,
Against their own marriages, often commit grievous sin.

Once we are grown, ready to create our own families,
It takes a great deal of focus to create who WE will be.
Those who continue to cling desperately to rules from their pasts
Will have a more difficult time making their own families last.

My husband has been most gracious as I affected a "do over".
I'm quite sure that I was a better granny than a mother.
All the children for whom he put aside his own desires
Have let us know, forcefully, their need for us has expired.

I have let friends know that we are setting new priorities;
Some have accused me of thinking only of ME.
This is probably true; for the first time since I was four,
I have all these choices. I have to choose which door.

My husband spends his days fulfilling his dreams
I have no primary responsibilities, it now seems.
I write because I feel a strong calling to do so;
It's for the pleasure of exchanging ideas, not my ego.

If I could have my fantasy life come completely true,
I'd live in the way that I've read some used to do:
Collecting a salon of philosophers, and artists,
I would then always have growth in our midst.

We would offer them fabulous food and libation,
In exchange for frequent access to their creations.
We would still enjoy a sacred day, for only us;
All the gifts of the past week, we could then discuss.

Parents who've lost touch with each other focusing on progeny
Have new access to adventures when their children break free.
How many of us give up, just when we can reclaim the fun
On which our combined journey through life was begun?










Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Another Sacred Sunday

The sky was a brilliant blue bouncing off the ripples in the harbor. Richard pointed out that the apparent navy blue of the water was in nice contrast to what he called the cerulean blue of the swimming pool that we look down on from our small balcony. As is our habit on Sunday mornings, we snuggle for a while, then get up and have coffee together, while chatting about anything and everything, from children and grandchildren to world affairs. We also like to make up fantasies about the families, furry and otherwise, that we observe from our rear window.

We were planning to take supper over to the home of a cardiologist friend who literally saved Richard's life in 2000. We always want to provide a special meal for him and his wife, a professional party planner (who was kind enough to provide me with deodorant, toothbrush, and a hairbrush when I began what we thought was Richard's death watch for ten days in ICU). The menu for this meal included Maker's Mark Old Fashioneds, pork tenderloin medallions with a tarragon cream sauce (so good I'd like to bathe in it), steamed fresh, buttered green beans almondine, mushroom risotto (which I chose because I love it but don't have the patience to make it), one of Richard's super tossed salads, and a blueberry-peach galette with fresh whipped cream.

I made him promise to let me assist, in order to free up the time for more snuggling and to go out to breakfast. After a leisurely breakfast at Waffle House, we joined forces in the kitchen, he as chef and I as his assistant (or was it the other way around?).  We cranked up the mood music and went to work. Oh! the slicing, dicing, grating and mincing that went on in that tiny kitchen: peaches, shallots, garlic, parsley, carrots, radishes, mushrooms, onions (red and yellow), peppers, and romaine. Precision, being right up Richard's alley, I am always happy to leave all of these tedious tasks to him.

The only problem was that this left little time for him to do any actual cooking. It fell to me to stir the pots. I don't know how many of you have ever made risotto, but stirring seems to be the most important ingredient: One hour of standing and stirring. Thank goodness I had Richard and wonderful music to keep me company.

Our cooking (and mood music) even brought out the poetic in him as he admitted that he thinks higher math and music can only come from the soul, as they both create something out of nothing. This led to a discussion of how Richard heard on NPR about a group of atheists who so missed the ritual, arts, and camaraderie of religion that they formed their own "church" of sorts. This philosophical discussion from a man who spends five days a week helping to refurbish a seventy-eight foot PT Boat at the National World War II Museum. Macho, macho man...

He is also the man who, before he was introduced to me twenty-three years ago, when told that I like to have discussions about the meaning of life, replied, "I'll show up fifteen minutes early and explain it to her."

Our friends live in a beautifully traditional Garden District home where his mother and father had reared their brood of six. The screened front porch sits atop a "daylight" above ground "basement". With the wonderful "feels like fall" weather, we enjoyed cocktails and appetizers as we breathed in the sounds and scents of Old New Orleans.We then moved inside for Sunday supper

Their home has original artwork everywhere you look, and the table is always beautifully attired for fabulous feasts. This day there was an exquisite ecru cotton crochet tablecloth that they brought back from Brugge, Belgium, and lovely Jazz playing in the background.

The meal was sincerely worth the effort put in. We loved watching and hearing the expressions of delight coming from both of these highly sophisticated palates, and the beautiful Hebrew blessing that our host asked upon us and our offering of fine food was the cherry on our Sacred Sunday.

Monday, September 10, 2012

Why Are We?

Why are we celebrating instead of worrying incessantly
When we reach sixty-five, and are, from our jobs, free?
We then live off the taxes paid by our children's generation;
This isn't what was envisioned as "Social Security" in our nation.

Not one of us wants to see the widowed, orphaned or disabled
Have to beg for a place at our society's abundant table.
We set up a tax-funded programs as a safety net for them,
Not a way out of work for differently-abled women and men.

What horrible abuses of our generosity and naivety
That generation after generation, on our payroll, stay.
These are people who have provided not even a fraction
Of what they will collect from the lobbyist's actions.

If there was a way I could end my life with dignity
So that my grandchildren would be, from my debt, free,
I would gladly give any years I have left to them,
Hoping they will do a better job than my generation.

I am so tired of blowing the horn of consequences
To those who make societal control pretenses.
I now hide behind my home's walls and make pleas
That we will, one day, magical thinking cease.

Each of our actions, including our own speech,
Has long-lasting consequences, perhaps to teach?
It matters not whether we are sober or inebriated,
Our behaviors are that by which our values are rated.

How can we continue to collect on others' sacrifice,
Though we have ample resources, to our needs suffice?
The fallacy of the unregulated stock market is plain to me:
Bankruptcy of the vulnerable, so the rich continue to be.

Don't get me wrong, I am considered part of the rich;
My access to perverse power has long made me itch.
I have given away much of our jointly held resources;
My desire for justice has led to lively discourses.

A whistle blower must have the contacts to infiltrate,
To have the information and terms with which to relate.
I am sickened by what I have gathered from non-profits;
There are many on whom the shoe of corruption fits.

All who want justice in our deeply divided nation
Must unite against our church/state ideation.
A corporation that, by definition, is a sovereign  entity
Shouldn't have privileges from which citizens are free.

I am so tired of the visions and platforms of politicians
Pretending they care about our spiritual convictions.
Only the individual person, not a corporation, has a soul;
Democracy, as its purpose, seeks to include the whole.

I'm not sure that, under a republic, our nation should stay;
I believe that this system has seen its best days.
Because we exempt "our" representatives from our laws,
Our consequences, as citizens, give them little pause.

We go along to get along, believing we have no power,
But rational voices on the internet can grow by the hour.
I'd like to see more about what others truly believe,
Not religious and political messages, by others conceived.

How do we apply our beliefs to our own families?
How do we benefit from caring communities?
What benefits do we each derive from paying tax?
What are we willing, as humans, to give back?

Our country and religions build in protections
We continue to want to age past all projections.
Who is willing to give up some of their own life
To secure, for the next generation, less strife.?










Saturday, September 8, 2012

Forgiveness and Forgetfulness

Starting over can be a most wonderful thing,
But there is always some loss that this brings.
Some have started over way too many times;
In long-term relationships there are many crimes.

It may be time now to go on without many
Of those with whom, resolution, there can't be any.
Having been told too many times to forgive,
Without any changes in the way others live.

Forgiveness is accomplished rather easily;
Reconciling relationships remains the mystery.
Sometimes those you struggled with all your life
Will continue to, in your soul, create much strife.

It is sad in many cases, no matter how hard you both try,
You can only forgive each other and then say good-bye.
Relationships are based on equal vulnerability;
Without this, reconciliation will never be.

Somehow, we seem to have lost belief in The Great;
Scripture shows that this seals a generation’s fate.
We do not have to all call Greatness by the same name,
As long as we all, by our actions, True Greatness claim.

Greatness isn’t measured by earthly riches or power;
It is measured by our every action during every hour.
Too many turn to arrogance and hubris for respect
Because, we as a civilization, continue to virtue reject.

When will we wake up and realize that all history
Is written also to warn us of what we don’t want to be?
When we are faced with that about which we are unsure,
All but what our ancestors did seems to become a blur.

We seem not to trace very far to see what happened then,
And continue to repeat the mistakes of our past humans.
Can we stop for a moment and stop following blindly
People who dictate to us rules from which they are free?

Religious history seems to have begun with a belief in
Incredible mystery and the power in all of creation.
Somewhere along the line, some said they understood;
This hasn’t yet led humankind into doing good.

Let each search for our own visions of balance and harmony,
Rather than competing about whether “God” is he or she.
And let us look for leaders in our sisters and brothers
Who lead with respect for, and interest in, all others.









Friday, September 7, 2012

Sadness and The Spirit

It is a sad fact of relationships that what gives one peace gives another pain;
This sometimes means that we cannot share goals and our lives again.
It does not necessarily mean that either of us did anything wrong;
It may simply mean that our Spirits dance and sing to different songs.

Areas in which one feels comfortable, another simply cannot dwell.
Stories that one doesn't want to hear, another feels compelled to tell.
Things that one savors may seem too foreign to fit another comfortably,
And events in one's life that another person cannot bear to see.

Although our souls will always and each contain something of each other
It takes comfort with each other's boundaries to feel as sisters and brothers
As long as we are locked into a mindset that won't consider change,
We will always consider each others ways foreign, wrong, or strange.

Close observation of the way people behave in business and family
Seems to be the very best way to know their true boundaries.
When we are in groups of our own kind, we all pretend to be the same,
But operating in the world of others, we show the values that we claim.

Sometimes we celebrate that people we love are happy together,
Even though we may grieve because we're not birds of a feather.
If the way a dear friend lives is a source of spiritual distress,
The discomfort both friends feel cannot always be redressed.

We are never at  the very same place on the same spiritual path.
Sometimes it may be one's time to cry when another needs to laugh.
We cannot grab others around their necks and make them see with us,
But the power of love can give us peace, if in the process, we will trust.





Thursday, September 6, 2012

Competition or Community?

Where we went wrong in our religions is allowing them to become corporations;
This seems to be the problems we're also having with business in our nations
Religions are about community, cooperation, and  personal responsibility,
Values from which all corporations and their protected heads are free.

In times of severe crisis Americans are still neighbors helping neighbors;
In communities we believing in the fairness and balance of returning favors.
Other countries believe that there are some who deserve to be kings,
But this is not the freedom song with which American democracy rings.

Community brings up leaders with vision and exemplary actions,
Not simply those with connections, wealth, and physical attraction.
Community realizes that long range good for one must be good for all;
Exempting some from rules and consequences causes communities to fall.

We have come to a place in our lives, religions, and our nations
Where we long to be our own informed and equal representation.
This is the only way we won't continue to be dragged under
By those who are allowed our power, trust, and resources to plunder.

Let's go back to community, churches, schools, and small businesses
To form unions of individuals, this is what our early ancestors did.
We have to stop hiding behind large groups that turn to mob think
And take seriously "the chain is only as strong as its weakest link."

We can help to alert others if someone is about to hurt the whole,
Not as a way to harm, but as a way save all our souls.
But this can only be done if we're willing to treat all others
As potential community members, neighbors, sisters, and brothers.

We cannot fire errant family members or non-productive citizens,
But if they take from others, their freedoms and rights should end.
We must stop following false family, community, and church leaders;
This way is that from which the many civil rights movements freed us.

Do we want to belong to corporations with no individual responsibility,
Or do we want to belong to community where we may not always agree?
Where we are committed to the well being of ourselves and each other?
I believe Americans have the framework for communities like no other.




Wednesday, September 5, 2012

What Does Love Look Like?

We talk a great deal about giving up one's life for love.
We often believe that this means dying for another.
Every time we give a bit of ourselves to another,
When done with joy, it requires sacrifice of ourselves.
It is a great deal easier to assume that we would die once
Than it is to be vulnerable to a little daily death to self.
When we open to another, we exchange parts of ourselves;
This dwelling in each other is the real Holy Spirit of humanity.

As you go through your day, where do you see love?
Not hear it, but really see it, and have it warm your soul?
When my husband looks at me with his mischievous grin,
The twinkle in his eyes says "I love you" to my very marrow.
A friend spends time in email discussion, only between us;
This says we are vulnerable to each other; that's love.
Turning to each other and speaking into each others hearts,
With all outside distractions put aside; that look is love.

A husband's gift of a rock from his walk on the beach
Because his wife likes rocks to bound her garden.
When a granddaughter sits next to her granny at a movie.
When a granddaughter falls asleep in her granny's lap.
When a wife sits silently at her sick husband's bedside,
And a father gets up in the night with his crying child.
A husband slows his stride to take the hand of his wife.
A dad and son under a blanket with dad's morning coffee.

Mom and daughter laying side-by-side in the summer sun.
Pet owners stooping to pick up the poop of their pups.
A husband adjusting the hot tub temperature for his wife.
Spouses doing each others' dirty laundry, even underwear.
A daughter respectfully advising her mom on her wardrobe.
Parents changing babies' dirty diapers, no matter how smelly.
Sons and daughters doing the same for infirm parents.
A husband digging a beloved deceased dog's grave.

When a grandson agrees to have lunch with you
And doesn't ask for money or text at any time.
A child comes to simply sit with an old parent.
Scooping a cat's litter; putting out food and water.
Donating platelets, blood, or bone marrow.
Cooking a favorite food for someone else.
Encouraging another's honest efforts.
Being available to simply soothe and be.


Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Heroism, Heirs, and Humanity

I honestly believe it is an act of heroism to decide when and how we should leave;
If we're no longer able to contribute, our families, at our deaths, shouldn't grieve.
Medical science has exceeded our ability to make compassionate choices;
We must, based on our own family and personal values, assert our own voices.

My husband wants to live as long as his incredible brain remains;
I have long asserted my right to not believe just the same.
I, without physical strength, don't feel I've much to give;
He, while he thinks, not articulates, feels he has reason to live.

There are many who may fight to keep my weary body alive;
He, without my help will not long, according to him, survive.
Where are the boundaries for the life we owe to others;
When can we give up our roles as earth fathers and mothers?

I used to think I made a difference staying upon this earth;
This was probably necessary to those I had given birth.
But I cannot, for the life of me, begin to comprehend
Reluctance of those with no goals to have their lives end.

This generation has the internet to get all useful information;
This leaves all those with experience no honored life's station.
What good is history for those who are into adventure?
They can't seem to see that their history is their value's center.

I don't need to understand or pretend to comprehend
The things that will happen at this world's end.
I believe we are all commanded, no matter our birth,
To create a peaceful, heavenly existence right here on earth.

I know that this is not the popular rulers' opinion;
This would take away the supremacy of their dominion.
If we all agree to get along for the future of all children,
There may be no more reason for war or for abortion.

Separate groups encourage unbridled procreation
For the increased powers of their own independent nations.
When will they stop fearing and begin to try to understand
All are in the "image of 'God' ", as long as they are human?

We give up our humanity when we turn away from The Spirit.
The "voice" begins very small, so that only we can "hear" it.
Every minute of every day, It is tap, tap, tapping on our souls
Asking us to "feed" It, so our humanity will remain whole.

It is so sad in life that anyone with a ready smile
Is thought to be a fool, with the reasoning of a child.
That secret smile that lives behind the eyes of joy
Is the greatest blessing coming from every girl and boy.

But our world wants to toughen them up for "reality";
We share our adult problems they may never need to see.
Innocence taken from us can be hard to watch in others;
Preserving it should be the job of fathers and mothers.

Wanting our children as peers, we burden them with our pain;
In many people, the peaceful joy can never be regained.
Some have had it dimmed in the womb by drugs and alcohol,
Never having the innocence shine in them at all.

Can we feed the joy back into such damaged, starving souls?
Can they ever heal the scars that are wrapped around their souls?
When we start looking at differences with loving interest, instead of fear,
Our joy may "speak" to them loud enough for their souls to "hear".

Instead we look away and ridicule them behind their backs,
Pretending their is some "norm" that the "different" one lacks.
We attack their joy until their light is eventually snuffed out;
I don't think exclusion is what compassion is about.

I takes all kinds and beliefs to build a vibrant community
This is how a peaceful, healthy world is set up to be.
When we realize that all creation is part of Divine Energy,
We will be able to, from fear, set our Spirits free.








Monday, September 3, 2012

McCarthyism in Our Midst


We say that we are now color-blind, but ignore hatred.
We say we're standing up for justice that was belated.
What do we do to the groups we have always scorned,
Not in the group we accept and embrace as "the norm"?

When we try to punish, drug, and kill people for not fitting in;
This is where most justification of evil  seems to begin.
Those who disagree with "the norm" must be silenced;
There should be no thought of , for injustice, recompense.

We have entered a new age of religious McCarthyism.
Our religions and our government desperately need a schism.
The horrors of the old religious ways of controlling others
Makes enemies, masters, and slaves of sisters and brothers.

Have humans learned anything in three thousand years,
That lack of understanding is what begets most fears?
The thing most destructive is the fear-fueled aggression
That seems to be our nation's most dangerous obsession.

If there is a Spirit of Wholeness, it seems very plain to me
That this, not religion, is what we must pray for and seek.
The religious should go back to the words of Genesis,
Or admit that "In Our Image and Likeness" is a myth.

Sunday, September 2, 2012

Secrets and the Sacred

I'm always suspicious of those who are very secretive about their lives;
Community knowledge of people's acts is how communities thrive.
We have become a nation that seems to me to be quite immoral
Because none of us have knowledge of each other that is useful.

Going home to closed windows and doors, nobody hears the screaming;
There are no community penalties for relationships that are demeaning.
Not even the families who are falling apart and committing acts of violence,
In our privacy above all else society, stand even half a chance.

Where is the governing body to protect and guide the vulnerable?
We even fight to keep abusers from using conception control.
What is the point of increasing evil, no matter the root cause?
The sins of the parents to the fourth generation should give us pause.

We are born with animal natures; some have had their Spirit spark killed.
The degeneration of humans into animals is not what The Spirit willed.
But parents who give birth by force or as a result of inebriation
Are not likely to produce children open to the Spirit of salvation.

Even those we call heathens who cherish their spouses and their young
Have the hallmarks of the God image of which the sacred songs are sung.
But those who procreate as an exercise in earthly power or wanton pleasure
Are not likely to add to the fulfillment of The Sacred's endeavors.

How I hate acts of killing, be it murder, war, self-defense or abortion;
Until we accept that we can't control others, this will be our portion.
We live in judgement of "others" without real knowledge or justification;
Fear and hatred, instead of understanding and consensus, kills nation after nation.




Saturday, September 1, 2012

Piety and Promiscuity

I have a confession to make about the Hindu sacred scripture;
I thought about naming it, but I wasn't quite sure.
The Kama Sutra isn't quite "The Song of Song's".
How does it, in the annals of sacred scripture, belong?

It's not the illustrated version, only the text,
To calm those who may, to the pictures, object.
I think I would belong in that group of "prudes"
Flaunting copulating bodies to me seems plain crude.

I have burning curiosity about what others deem sacred,
And I know that much art depicts people who are naked.
But I never have been much of an athlete or acrobat,
And there are lots of these poses I don't want to look at.

One thing I can say is that if there's a moral message here,
It does not in any way, to me, seem to be made clear.
And the mental pictures I'm getting from the prose
Seems to be a source where pornography arose.

Forget the many religious meanings of morality;
This text definitely promotes sexual promiscuity.
The men who wrote it seem to have no ability
To see the results of not taking responsibility.

To think that we have to teach young people pleasure
Misses the point of innocence by a very large measure.
When the time is right and there's a friend they can trust,
They will find ways to, each others wants and needs, adjust.

We make a mistake by putting romantic love first;
Seeking sex before friendship is a relationship's curse.
Even small children are encouraged to entice sexually;
Their lack of protection is frightening to me.

And the poor duped people who think they have learned
How "all" men or women feel, and then they are spurned.
Unless we are willing to open our souls to another,
The sex is simply animal action with each other.

It seems to me that the most important function of this unity
Is to allow our hearts, minds, and souls to be, from fear, free.
But unless we get to really know each other well,
Promiscuous sex will simply harden our protective shells.