AmyOutlaw.org

#46 Stop eating before you are full

Michael Pollan has done it again!  The author of the Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food, has written an even more accessible book about eating well, for health and coincidentally for sustainability.  It is entitled Food Rules, An Eater's Manual. It is out in paperback is small and has approximately one rule per page.  It is broken up into 3 sections which correspond to his general message message about food, which is "Eat food, mostly plants, not too much."

It seems like a simple statement, but contains much food for thought (forgive my pun). For instance food, means real food, nothing chemical, nothing fake- no phood!   Take this rule:

#2 Don't eat anything your great grandmother wouldn't recognize as food.

Each rule comes with a paragraph or two of explanation, but rarely over half a page long.

Another of my favorites in the 'eat food' section is:

#6 Avoid food products that have more than 5 ingredients.

Have you ever read the ingredients on most processed 'food'? It can be an extremely long list and most of them unpronounceable let alone edible!

I highly recommend buying a copy of this book- and USING the information in it.

 Intuition prods me to take a new way
     to the imaging center to get my annual mammogram
After a moment of doubt
     I turn onto the path to the bio-pond
          A sweet anomaly on Penn's campus
Overhung with trees and bushes
    drunk with last nights rain
          momentarily annoyed by second hand smoke
Unexpected in this little oasis
There they are- eight newly hatched ducklings
     unbearably cute and ridiculously fuzzy!
A small crowd of my own species
          oohs and ahhs
A two foot drop leaves me wondering
     will the mother prod them to a less precipitous spot?
Suddenly one sails over the edge-
          WHEEE!
Then two more , then the mother and the rest
   to human squeals and wordless exclamations
Grateful,
    filled with wonder and glee
 I head on my way
    with a little piece of inter-species delight
     tucked into my heart

 At our Quaker Meeting's weekend retreat on racial healing, lots about class come up, and I had the revelation (again) that Mom is just a working class party girl forced to pretend elsewise.  Not that there aren't other aspects of her personality worth mentioning, but she is definitely 'life of the party' to the core.  I really wish I had gotten to meet Granndpa Sam Outlaw, who I have been told she resembles more than any of his other offspring!

My mother, Martha Outlaw, is 87 years old and in the tenth year of increasing dementia.  Many of the last, approximately, 415 days that she has lived with me, I have been irritated or annoyed, until I realized a few months ago that I was actually deeply grieving the loss of the Mom I knew, while having to take care of this often amusing, sometimes cranky old lady who is masquerading as my mother!

Though frail, Mom has been incredibly healthy, until about 5 weeks ago. She got a bad cold with a lingering cough and then virtually stopped eating, with no apparent cause.  So we started taking her to the doctors to have blood tests done, and various x-rays and body scans.  It turned out to be an impacted bowel- but I won't go into the gory details here. She has gradually gotten better since 'the cure'. But there were some things still to check out, to make sure all was well, so back to the hospital we went.

 

During most of the previous 5 weeks she had no energy and was acting kind of depressed, but she was her amazing self at the hospital yesterday.  She was cranky and mad a Judy, her other main caretaker, on the way there, partly or perhaps solely, because she had soiled herself just before we left and Judy was pretty directive in the cleaning up of it- AND got it done!  But there was no problem getting her cooperation or the blood drawn once in the tech's room. There was a line of several people waiting when we were leaving and she commenting loudly, "Isn't it amazing how many people are lining up to get hurt!" That made just about everyone in the hall laugh or smile.  Then as we were entering the elevator, she turned and waved good-by, saying, "Take care everybody, hope you make it out alive!" This time even making me guffaw!

 

She was unhappy waiting so long for the x-ray, it was quite busy over there, but once we got into the x-ray room she flirted with the cute young man who was the tech.  It was not the quasi-obscene flirting she can do, especially with any man who seems remotely near her age, but sweet and funny and he was charmed.

 

I realized (again) as we were leaving for home, that Mom is such a great model for connecting with people in public places and though she gets to be briefly the center of attention, the life of the party,  everyone benefits.  It is not as self-centered as it has seemed to me in the past, in fact, it may not be self-centered at all.  When we hold back form connecting with the people we meet, perhaps that is the most self-centered we can be.  Making people laugh, or even just smile and especially when some outrageous thing she says or does makes someone's day, is truly a gift that she gives.

 

It can be oppressive, if one feels one HAS to be entertaining or make people happy, as I know from personal experience, but Mom does it effortlessly; it IS who she is.  May I grow to be so, in my own way.  May we all. So be it.

 

 

 

 

My mother's main problem is boredom.  Since she has dementia and her short term memory is shot and there are serious holes in her long term memory, conversation is almost impossible. She can only talk about things she can see right now, right here, the coffee, the food, the dishes, the snow on the ground, how cold it is, the coffee, the food the dishes... you get the idea. 

Mom was a good cook and a great baker, she used to be quite the seamstress, too. She can still do the Charleston, though a pretty low-key version.  What a dancer she used to be! Most of these she cannot do now, not even a little.  So she watches a lot of old movies, musicals are the best because they are happier (she can get pretty upset at scary or mean things).  We have gotten pretty sick of the Music Man, her favorite, which she sometimes watches 2 times a day!

 

So what's to do? A little over a year ago when my sister sent her to a senior day care center, she seemed to enjoy bingo quite a bit.  But she made it clear that she did not want to go to THAT place ever again. Perhaps in the warm weather she and Judy, one of her caretakers, could wander by the neighborhood senior center for lunch, bingo (if they have it ) and dancing. My guess is that she has forgotten about the other one by now.

 

I honestly didn't think, Mom would live this long. She has had this slow moving kind of dementia for 10 years now.  Her older brother had something very similar and died at age 88. Mom's birthday is in a few weeks and she will be 87.  So, in all likelihood she will be around for, at least, another year. Solving the boredom problem is essential.

 

She browses the newspaper, but often gets upset at all the bad news.  I had decided to stop getting the paper, except the Sunday edition, sure that it would serve her needs all week, but my husband signed us up for another 6 months before we had had a chance to check in with each other about it.

One morning a week a friend with an 18 month old comes over and hangs out with Mom, which she absolutely loves.  She adores babies. It tires her out, but that's OK. Shortly after this started about 5 months ago, I asked another friend whose child is a bit older, but that didn't work out, and its probably for the best since Ellie is really beyond the age that enthralls Mom. I should check in with Asa whose son Ely is only a few months old, since they now live in the neighborhood.

 

In her little trailer on the bayou in Tarpon Springs, Florida, Mom had taken to virtually plastering the walls and cabinets with family pictures and odd little newspaper clippings.  At least, they seemed odd to me.  Now I see that they could have been a way to stimulate her memories.  Mostly they were color photos with captions of wildlife and events in and around Tarpon Springs.  Some were photos of the impressionist masterpieces that she loved.

 

Although I have already put up maps in the 2 spots she sits for hours a day in our house, and also a cat calendar which she enjoys, I see now that I should put up a lot more stuff. The trouble is our local newspaper only carries BAD news.  I am not joking. Yesterday I looked though the paper to find something to put up and could find nothing!  Maybe I could clip some interesting pictures out of old National Geographics.

Since starting to write this- I find writing often helps me to understand what's going on- I talked with Judy, suggesting that when the weather permits she try walking around the corner with Mom to the Senior Center. That very afternoon she took Mom over there and they had lunch ($1) and played bingo and did a little dancing! Yay! But, now I have to register Mom.  I talked to the administrator who is very nice and got the lowdown on how to register her. Unfortunately Mom has no current documentation of how old she is! I am sure I will sort it out in the end, even if we have to get her a non-drivers ID.  (I can just imagine us waiting in that line for hours, and Mom asking me over and over again why we are there!)

Another thought I had was to get more children's books.  Mom actually likes to read them.  Sometimes she even reads them to the 5 year old who has been staying with us!  She can no longer read full length novels, both the small print and memory loss prevent any sustained reading. Perhaps I can find some of the old children's books she used to read to me when I was little.  Thrift store here I come!

 

This morning in our local newspaper, the Philadelphia Inquirer, I read a piece about "A Gang of Killers..." about a horrible gang killling a year ago.  In it Kevin Riorden spoke words of wisdom which we all need to hear and take to heart in this day and age. Yes, the description of the torture and murders of the two victims was revolting, and it will stay with me much longer than I would wish. But when he reported that some were calling the perpetrators cockroaches, I was reminded of the genocide in Ruanda and Burundi.  Over and over the message was sent out via radio, "Kill the cockroaches! Rid our country of these pests!" inciting neighbors to hack down neighbors. Closer to home I am reminded of Abu Gahraib, the facility we, Americans, used in Iraq for torture and, yes, even, murder of detainees. This kind of dehumanization is never appropriate.

In the article is a quote from the movie Chinatown by a malevolent millionaire, "Most people never have to face that fact that at the right time and the right place they are capable of ... anything."  This is a needed reminder that all of us are capable of terrible things, thank goodness most of us never find out what we are capable of under the "right" (or wrong) circumstances. It is painful to remember that less than 100 years ago people, mostly African-American men, were lynched by mobs of average US citizens. (In fact, the last recorded lynching was in 1964!)

I know from my own life, now that I have almost reached 60, that I have done things, maybe not great evil, but bad things, most often unintentionally, but not always. When I search my heart, I know I am, essentially, no different from others who have done worse. When there is a cultural shift, when it becomes acceptable to call people names in public, especially dehumanizing names, it is a slippery slope, especially in economic hard times, to what happened in Germany. Hold people accountable for their actions. Do not begin to act like them, not even in the smallest ways by dehumanizing them verbally, not even in our rage and sorrow.

Fortunately, the reverse of the movie quote is also true. We are capable of compassion, seeing through stereotypes and taking action, brave, caring action in the right circumstances, or even the wrong ones. Let us seek, together, to reinforce this in each other, to encourage and inspire each other.  I am reminded of another quote, one of my favorites from Mother Theresa, "What I do you cannot do; but what you do, I cannot do. The needs are great, and none of us, including me, ever do great things. But we can all do small things, with great love, and together we can do something wonderful."

Once and always there was the Light, and since that is all there was, it was as if all was darkness. The Light that is also Not- Light is in the depths of all that is. What we call light in this realm is but a mere shadow of that.  This Light that was also darkness, is pure potentiality, pure love, all possibility and endless regenerative energy. What we call energy in this realm is a mere shadow of that.

 

When the universe was evoked from the Light that is also Not-Light, a great flaring forth occurred, an outpouring that was also an in-pouring, and an enormous explosion of energy came into being.  Indeed in that instant all the energy that exists in this realm, in this event we call the universe, was created, and no new energy has since been created. It has seemed as if this energy is endless because the universe is so vast, vast beyond all human imagining.

 

For the longest time, an eternity of time, the energy coalesced here, and then there until eventually atoms formed, then molecules then clouds of molecules, then stars and galaxies were born,  as some are still so doing. Some stars grew and grew, burning more and more brightly until within them new versions of energy were formed, new combinations of atoms became molecules never before seen. Heavy with new possibility, these giant stars exploded in firey self-sacrifice, the dissolution of themselves allowing new forms to come into existence.  The giant stars exploded and the dust full of these new forms gradually coalesced to form planetary systems revolving around new stars.  This, seemingly violent expansion followed by contraction, happened and is still happening, as new stars and planetary systems form.

 

Our very own Earth and our star, we call the Sun, were formed thus. For eons our Earth was a piece of molten rock, slowly cooling as it circled endlessly round the Sun, and as it did so something new came into existence, a new combination of atoms formed water and it rained for a million years, helping to cool the planet.  All the water that came into existence on Earth then is all there is, no new water has been created since.

 

Many eons after that, what we call life came into being. One way of distinguishing life from the other form of being is that up until that instant there had been creating and giving, and now there was taking and reproduction. What we call life was able to take the energy of others, freely given or not, and use it to create more of itself.  Thus the Givers and the Takers came into existence. Before that moment only Givers existed, those beings were all that was. Now there were two kinds, Givers and Takers were created both as different, though still part of all.

 

It is the nature of all that is, that when something new comes into existence it grows out of what was, so that it has what was, buried with in it.  Thus all that came into existence, all the Givers have what can be called a forth dimension, an interiority that is connected to the Light that is also darkness, pure potentiality, pure love, and all possibility... and likewise Deep within the Takers, in their hearts lies a Giver, the impulse to love and give, to share their very essence without gain for themselves. Deeper, still, lies the forth dimension, an interiority that connects to the infinite energy, pure love and all possibility of the Light that is also Not-Light.

 

Our Sun, for instance, is a Giver.  Givers are not capable of any action but giving. They have the potential of creating, but almost completely linked to the dissolution of their very being. Our Sun burns 4 million tons of itself every second, creating heat and light and sending it out, bestowing it indiscriminately.  All the energy that fuels life on Earth comes directly or indirectly from the Sun, this gorgeous burning generosity, this brilliant self-sacrificing being around whom we orbit.

 

What we call life, the Takers- yes even plant-life, captures energy, ingests it and makes more of itself, grows bigger and reproduces other beings that are more of itself. Plants first invented the capacity to do this by directly capturing the photons the Sun creates and sends out.  Animals then invented the capacity to eat plants and/or other animals to get the energy stored there to grow and to procreate. It is the very nature of what we call life to do so.  It is a curious thing that built into life, Takers, is the capacity to create something new and different, at least, slightly different from themselves, most often as a response to something outside of themselves, such as a change in the environment, but also in response to radiation altering something on the genetic level. However, even more astonishing, Takers also have the capacity to respond on the very deepest level, to grow, change, evolve toward greater complexity, diversity and a greater capacity for awareness and self awareness or what is called consciousness, which appears to come both directly and indirectly from the fourth dimension, the interiority that all beings have, the direct connection to the infinite Light ad energy that is the ground of all being. It is as if a desire was placed in the very heart, of Takers to give back all that we take and then some. This is the desire to be more like a Giver, and an attempt to be more like the Source from which all is evoked.

 

So be it.

 

 

 

 

Recently I have slowly, almost accidentally, begun a relationship with the nuns who live around the corner.  Assumption Sisters it says on their door and it turns out they are of the Augustinian Order, not that I know what that means. Sister Clare, or Clare, as it seems she would like to be addressed is the leader and I have had the most dealings with her. She must be 10 or 12 years older than me, gray-haired, but not elderly in any way. They have a community room which is available to neighborhood groups for free and twice our Quaker worship group has met there.

A few days ago I approached them about using the community room and their rather large DVD/video player for a film series I want to make happen.  Sister Clare  seemed quite enthusiastic in her way and immediately said yes.  I intend to call the film and discussion series "We are TURNING THE TIDE", and hope to inspire, deeper understanding, community and action. The sort of wide focus is women and men transforming the culture of domination and saving the Earth using non-violent direct action. Some films I own, others I hope to own in the near future and some I will rent or get from the Library.  Such films as TAKING ROOT, the story of Wangari Maathai,  the Kenyan founder of the Greenbelt Movement and recipient of the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize, DIRT, featuring Vandana Shiva and others, ENTERTAINING ANGELS, the story of Dorothy Day and the beginning of the Catholic Worker Movement, Brian Swimme's THE HIDDEN HEART OF THE COSMOS and several others.

While discussing this with Sister Clare, I found out that there are prayer times every morning and some once a month groups that interest me sponsored by or in association with the Assumption Sisters. She told me that there is a Centering Prayer group that consists mostly of Mennonites, and a Taize Chant group that is quite ecumenical.  I am exploring using their beautiful new chapel (with a green roof) for my own silent prayer in the morning and then joining them for their morning programmed prayer at 7:30 AM. So far, its been a comedy of errors and misunderstandings (mostly on my part), which I think have been cleared up.

One result was that  on Monday when I went at 6:15 and the chapel wasn't open, I eventually wandered across the street to St. Francis de Sales Cathedral, and sat in silent worship there for about 15 minutes. (I now, know that Mass is at 7:00 AM, which the nuns attend, and that if I want to worship silently in their chapel I have to get there between 6:15 and 6:54 to be let in.  Actually, this morning I was given the door lock code to let myself in!) As I was leaving the church some literature caught my eye and I took a few pamphlets home with me. One especially speaks to me.  It is an invitation to join a Catholic lay women's group, but has a universal message:

Find God at the heart of the world.
Drink from the well of goodness and blessing.
Look deeply at Creation with the eyes of love.
Walk with Jesus in companionship with other women.
Be the Good News.
 

 

I.

 

The waspy Philadelphia yoga instructor

Compelled by her own inability to say "no"

Compelled by LOVE or some combination of both

Finds herself in Turkey, listening to victims of American torture

Awkwardly attempting to be a compassionate witness

Writing down every word in the court room

These men one by one, tell their stories, their lives

And their forgiveness

Heart breaking open like the split pomegranates

In Istanbul markets

She is forever broken open and tender

 

Back home, experiencing reverse culture shock

PTSD-like flashbacks of violence and degradation

Not her own, yet now belonging to her

Writes a play and performs

Love Letters from Abu Graib

 

II.

 

Jesus proclaimed, "You are loved!"

2011 years later we fail to know it still

"I have loved you with an everlasting love,

Beyond, measure, beyond time..."

Jeremiah proclaims of God's love for us.

Our hearts too small. Ten sizes too small.

When wilt thou save the people?

O, God of mercy, when?

 

 

III.

 

Volunteering at a hospital in Botswana

I was compelled to love a little girl

3 months old, abandoned and adorable

Instructed via heartstrings to care for her

My presence on the children's ward

Became ordinary all hours of the day and odd at night

Not allowed to take her home, foster or adopt her

Hilary was growing up in the hospital

 

My heart broke when I had to leave

Never knew I could love one not of my birthing

I grieved for her presence and her future

Like the death of a daughter the ache was so keen

Upon returning, I saw the love in the head nurse's gestures and eyes

The maintenance ladies hands and laughter

When Hilary began to walk

They sent her, (with tears in their eyes)

To live with her eighty something great grandmother

Over the boarder in Zimbabwe

 

I hope and pray that she will come to know the story 

Every time she lost someone, someone else stepped up

To love her, simply love her and care for her

Not just the story of her losses

 

 

IV.

 

You are loved, should you doubt, consider this:

Have you ever lain down at night and gazed up at the stars?

Now imagine you are looking down at them

What happens? Why don't you fall?

What holds you to the Earth?

Gravity, of course! But what is gravity, really?

Scientists will tell you what gravity does

But cannot tell you what it is.

I assure you it is love

Love, Earth's love holds you close.

 

Worship God and create community within the sacred, evolving, gorgeous, celebratory event we call the universe.*

 

I was deeply moved by last Wednesday's meeting for worship. Both the sense of not being alone; God always being with us and the question (reworded), "how, then, shall we live?" have been with me on and off all week. We live in such a hyper-individualistic culture that I must qualify all that I say with the admonition, all that we do must be rooted in community, with the help of God, the Holy Mystery, and each other we can find our way.  There are many ways to live, many ways forward, many ways to manifest the portion of love we have been given, the gifts both spiritual and earthly that have been benevolently bestowed upon us, indeed, showered upon us, that we have mostly squandered, like the prodigal son, in Jesus' parable.

 

It has become clearer and clearer to me that the universe, itself, in all its beauty, grandeur and mystery, is the primary revelation of God, and that we are a part of this, not separate from it. Though this has always been true, and all religion has been an attempt to interpret this revelation, it is only now, in the 21^st century, that we can begin to fully appreciate the immensity and depth, the intricacy and delicacy of all its numinous nuances. So too everything we do must be rooted in this knowledge; the universe can be described as a single, self-organizing, evolving, gorgeous, celebratory event, rather than a once and for all static creation. God, Holy Mystery, is embedded in every aspect of this event, though not confined to it.

 

Like the prodigal son, we must come home, come home to live in the 21^st century, to be in it but necessarily of it.  Certainly not in the culture that exists, that is ravaging the planet, God's creation, that has caused the withering of our home, our Earth. We must create alternative (subversive, even!) cultures and communities, right where we are, right where we live. We must be committed to building community and building it across all lines of unnatural division (race, class, gender, religion etc.).  We must begin to live the truth that we, all humans, are  members of one species; one species among many species in the commonwealth community of Earth.

 

Whatever we do, must not only be done in love, but in accordance with God's primary revelation.  We must ask ourselves and each other:

 

Does this action/lifestyle move us toward a deepening of our sense of oneness? Is it mutually beneficial for all members of the Earth community? Is it in accordance with our best understanding of the unfolding of God's plan as witnessed to in the evolving universe?

 

And because so many of us have a new found appreciation for Christ Jesus/the Christ principle, we must also ask:

 

In light of the new understanding of the universe as the primary revelation of God, how does Jesus speak to us, now, in this century? Seeking the spaciousness within that mirrors the depth and breadth of the event we call the universe, what is Christ Jesus saying to us, through his words, stories and life?

 

It seems to me that for, at least, the last 1000 years, Christians have focused on and emphasized getting into heaven after death, on salvation and on worshiping God in the form of Jesus Christ, the Redeemer- not exclusively, but primarily.  (Some scholars assert that this is a direct result of the Black Plague that swept through Europe killing 35%-75% of the population in 3 years!) Perhaps it is time, now, to focus on Jesus' original message. He preached that God was like a father, one that loves his children unconditionally.  In other words, God loves us, each one of us, warts, bumps, mistakes and all.  Jesus also preached that the Kingdom of Heaven, the Kingdom of God is within us and among us (at one and the same time, I am convinced). Jesus also admonished us to love one another as he loves us, as God loves us. In fact, when Jesus was asked what was the greatest commandment, his answer was, "to love God with all your heart, mind and soul, and to love your neighbor as yourself."

 

Bringing these into the 21^st century, it is clear that our neighbor is not just our human neighbor, it is also all the other animal and plant neighbors, up to and including the Earth itself. What might not be as clear yet to most of us is that since God is embedded in every part of the event we call the universe, that everything, EVERYTHING from the smallest quark or nutrino to the largest galaxy, from the tiniest living microbe on Earth to the very planet, itself- including everything that we have come to think of as inert, inanimate or non-living, everything has interiority, everything has depth, soul, consciousness, that of God.

 

Therefore, we are called:

 

1. to view humankind as one species among species that make up the Earth commonwealth community, to treat all human beings as our brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, AND all children as our own.

 

2. to recognize the RIGHT of all other beings to existence in their natural habitat

 

3. to recognize, experience and to live out the heaven, the kingdom of God that is and is becoming in each of us and among us, e.g. creating a multiplicity of cultures/societies where it is easy to love one another as ourselves, cultures where it is easy to respect each other, treat each other as equals and to have mutually enhancing relationships and economies.

 

4. to love our neighbors as ourselves, including all species of the Earth commonwealth community, to rejoice in the health and growth of other species (as a whole or individually), even as it means the constraint of our own selves/species, e.g. adopting a tree or a particular forest, an animal or a heard or flock (in the wild), falling in love with our bio-region and looking after it as we would a member of our family (perhaps instead of having our own child, or along with?)

5. to come to know and revere the universe as revelation, as fully as possible, e.g. engage in the new 3 R's: reverence, resonance and reverberation. Reverence for the beauty, grandeur and mystery... by resonance is meant the perception and comprehension of each part of the whole, each tree, animal, human being or galaxy... our true goal, reverberation, indicates, being drawn into the depth of the thing, whatever we find ourselves draw to, to experience its interiority, to receive its radiance, the radiance we cannot perceive without entering into its depth, soul or consciousness.

 

5. (in order to do #4, or any of these), we are called to free ourselves from our collective and individual entrancement with modern technology. Not necessarily reject it altogether, but to free ourselves of our addictions to it/them, our over-dependence on them etc. Freeing ourselves will allow the opportunity to fall in love with and be entranced by God's ongoing creation, and God as embedded in every aspect of it. For how can we do God's will if we are not listening for the voice of Holy Mystery in the sky above us, the trees beside us, the birds, the rivers, the lakes, the plains and prairies, the oceans, the abundant life here on Earth, including our brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, our children, all our children? (rather than listening to our MP3's, or spending so much time surfing the internet or playing  computer games!)

 

6. to create community and communities, in ever larger circles, and to start where we are, with the ones close by.  "Love the ones you're with". 

 

7. to increase individual and corporate capacity for compassion. E.g. create and/or join groups where it is easy to grow our own and others' compassion. Create new modes of being that will replace and undermine the current industrial, perpetual growth consumer mode which is causing the planet to wither and which has been and continues to destroy so many of our neighbor species, as well as cause wars and systems of domination that have created a kind of living hell on Earth for so many.

 

8. to seek God in all that we do, to seek that of God in everyone and everything, e.g. take enough time to pray, to withdraw, to go inward, to retreat in nature, to celebrate and renew our spirit, to let the love of God fill us and flow through us, find the ways that work for us and do them every day, so that we can do all we  do in love and Holy obedience.

 

* in imitation of Michael Pollan, who wrote In Defense of Food and gave away his whole message in one line, "Eat food, mostly vegetables, not too much."

 

This is not the kind of message I like to get and give in Meeting for worship (Quaker  Sunday service). In fact, if I had to characterize my mission in life as currently understood, it would be "to proclaim God's love in all times and in all places". However, this is sometimes how I can tell that a message is truly from the Divine Mystery and not from me, when it feel uncomfortable, or not 'like' me.

Yesterday I wrestled with this message for a good part of the hour and almost got up to speak it several times, but each time I was about to, someone else began speaking. It was an unusually verbal worship.  In the branch of Quakers that I am a member of, worship is based in silent waiting, waiting for a sense of the Presence and perhaps a message or two.  In our large urban (large by Quaker standards) church, or meetinghouse, as we would say, there are often "too many" messages and not enough silence.  At many other meetinghouses there is too much silence and not enough messages, even though the presence of God can often be felt in a service that is completely silent.

Anyway, I finally stopped wrestling and felt a sense of peace and inspiration by listening to what others were saying and going deeper into the silence between messages.  However, I did not feel released from hearing and "preaching' this particular message. Perhaps there will come a time, another time when I will be requited to share this, or a similar message in worship, but for now I share it here.

EVERY DAY IS JUDGMENT DAY! This is one of the important things Jesus has  been saying to us,  and that we have continued not to hear.  Each day we have a choice.  We can live in the hell that we have created here on earth (despite the beauty and holiness of God's creation), or we can choose to live the eternal kind of life, NOW. The hell we have created, may need no explanation, but that doesn't usually stop me. Our societies, even the best of them continue to be full of pain, injustice, exploitation and abuse for most of its members or of people colonized, or not recognized as fully human, or all of the above.  And now we are seeing that we have don't all of the above to the earth, our home. Though each one of us individually cannot  be judged responsible for all the ills of our own society and culture, we do our part, consciously or not to keep it going in one way or another.

Currently, there is another kind of hell we create or choose, especially those of us living in this OZ, the so called Wonderland of modern 'Western'   technological, consumer democracies. Many of us live via the internet, are addicted to watching hour after hour of TV programs and movies on our computers, cannot go anywhere without those tings in our ears blasting our very own 10,000 songs- but I am beginning to get going on a rant... We are lonely and disconnected from each other and from anything larger than ourselves or a small group of friends, anything that could give our lives meaning, vision or hope, real hope not packaged fantasies.

Instead, even those of us, in pain, in prison or poverty, can choose to have heaven; the eternal kind of life, now, we do not have to wait until we die, in fact we must not wait. But, we can't do it by ourselves, or even, really for ourselves, alone. One brilliant step toward that eternal kind of life, now, is, to begin seeing ourselves as a species among species, that is, recognize all other humans as our direct kin, our sisters and brothers, fathers, mothers, grandparents, and the others species, plant and animals as our cousins- then, act accordingly. And here is where we need the help, not only from our siblings and parents, but from that mysterious source/being we call God.   Because to act lovingly, not only takes courage, perhaps even foolishness, but it takes not acting on all those un-loving impulses we get.  Most of them are completely natural reactions, someone gets in our way, denies us something, threatens us or upsets us in any way, there is an instinctive response; fight, run, hit, remove ...  And, of course, if you are in actual danger, you may well need to take action.  However, most of the time, if we stopped, noticed how we are feeling or reacting, took a breath, asked for help from another person or from God, we could see that something very different is required, and that most often (or at least a lot more often than we can imagine) a loving response rather than a thoughtless reaction will do. This does take effort, it requires searching, asking questions, being teachable, being open to being changed by the love and by the people and other being you are attempting to be loving towards.  It also will bring failure- BUT...

Living the eternal kind of life now, living heaven, now, being, and creating, co-creating the kingdom of heaven, or what many are now calling the reign of heaven or the republic of heaven, living it ,now, as best we can, helping to bring it about for others, this IS HEAVEN, this is the eternal kind of life, now.  It brings you closer to that which we call God, it allows you to be grateful, to be happy- Oh, not all the time, of course not!  Human life does actually require suffering, making mistakes, staring over, enduring... AND practicing does help: being grateful for what you have, rather than always looking for what you don't have, for instance. It is the oddest thing but the happiest people are the ones who feel happy doing for others- I don't mean being the kind of martyr that complains about martyrdom, or points it out. In fact, another odd thing is that we humans can't actually do any of the above for selfish reasons- and yet it is also true as Lincoln said, "that people are about as happy as they choose to be".

So, what will be folks? Since every day is judgment day, will you choose hell or heaven? I want the eternal kind of life, now- so I pray for help, listen to what Jesus says (Buddha also has some good advice, as do many other prophets of God) and try to figure out what a loving response would be to everyone and everything I encounter each day.  Of, course, I know this means, I will fail, and fail again tomorrow, but with assistance and nothing in my 'ear' to keep me from hearing God's will and encouragement, I will fail better each day.