Courage
I expect by now you’ve heard the story: seen the pictures of the people bludgeoned by water cannons, the dog in a gas mask, the sufi dervish whirling in the street with deliberate disregard for the danger of his surroundings. It started simply enough. A group of people decided to sit in to protest a public park being razed in order to put in one more shopping mall. A group of people, young and old, decided that they had had enough of their country being sold off to the highest bidder, enough of the rights of the people being stripped away at the pleasure of the powers that be. And so they went to sit in the park. And there they sat as the bulldozers came at them, non-violent protesters in the long and distinguished lineage of Gandhi and King and Tiananmen Square and so many others. And in the long and shameful lineage of the British in India and Bull Connor and the Chinese government in 1989 and so many others, the Turkish government responded with water cannons and pepper spray, with police in riot gear prepared to do whatever it takes to subdue the population.
Who will not be subdued. Who continue to flock to the streets. I understand the courage of those first protesters, the ones who decided to sit down in a park and make their presence felt, who were willing to see what would happen when they demanded that someone take the needs of the people, and not just the corporations, into account. Sometimes you summon up what is inside of you and do the brave thing, walk the talk. But what about all those other people, the ones who joined the protest once they knew about the water cannons and the pepper spray, once the news spread (by word of mouth and social media, since the official media kept a complete blackout) of the injured and the dead? What about them? What does it take to knowingly walk into that kind of danger and chaos?
It takes, I think, an allegiance to a self that is greater than the self that feels the police batons and the pepper spray—a self that is injured not by physical indignities, but rather by moral ones. Call it Soul, if you will, this larger self, or call it Community Consciousness or Human Dignity or Living in the Kingdom of God. Whatever it is, it does not belong to a particular time, or place, or religion. It’s what led Gandhi, the Hindu, and King, the Christian, and the young man (Buddhist?) who faced down a bulldozer in Tiananmen Square to counter violence with persistent love. It’s what holds the Sufi dervish dancing in the streets of Istanbul and Bill McKibben getting arrested on the steps of the White House in protest against the Keystone XL pipeline. Who we are is bigger than who we are.
Not all of us. Not all the time. But enough of us, enough of the time, that it seems possible that love might have a chance against greed, that freedom and justice might sometimes prevail. Not all the time. But maybe enough.
Where Danger Lurks
For the last week and a half the news has been pretty much all Boston bombing, all the time. Why wouldn’t it be? There was a horrific act of mayhem in which three innocent people were killed and 264 more were injured. There was a man hunt, a shoot-out, and a show-down that led to the capture of one of the perpetrators, who is now being grilled about his role in the terrible events. The media is full of interviews with everyone who has even the most tenuous connection with the Tsarnaev brothers, and their religion and motives are being analyzed to the finest detail.
In the meantime, a fertilizer plant has exploded in Texas, killing 14 and injuring 200 more. Although the tragedy was broadly announced, very little information seems to be making its way onto the public airwaves as to what led to this horrific event. Now that we know it wasn’t terrorism, we’ve pretty much let the subject drop.
What is it that is so much more compelling about the first tragedy than the second? Why does it deserve so much more of our national attention and imagination? Far more people were killed in Texas, and the property damage was devastating, pretty much flattening the small town. Their grief is just as real, their first responders just as brave.
There are, I’m sure, many explanations, but I’d suggest that the biggest reason for the different levels of national attention to the two tragedies has to do with a known flaw in the human brain. We are terrible at assessing risk. When we hear of a bombing, we imagine that it could happen to any of us. We see a world in which terrorists lurk behind every bush, and we want to do everything possible to stop the bad guys, and to punish their terrible acts of wrongdoing. When we hear of a factory explosion, it’s just an accident, and something that could not possibly happen to us, since we don’t happen to live next to a fertilizer plant.
But the reality is far different than the flight or fight systems in our brains would have us believe. The risk of terrorism to any given person in the US is infinitesimal. Your risk from a texting driver, a legal gun owner or a lightning strike is higher. Your risk, however, from under-regulated industry, of the type that caused the Texas explosion, the massive oil leaks that happened recently from pipelines in Arkansas and Texas, not to mention the Deepwater Horizon explosion that dumped over 200 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico as well as claiming the lives of 11 rig workers, is far, far greater. If you consider the subtler incursions of unsafe pesticides, genetically modified foods that may or may not be safe, air and water pollution and so forth, then your exposure to risk starts to approach 100%.
In response to the events of 9/11 and subsequent terrorist acts we have spent trillions of dollars and changed our lifestyles in ways that range from how we board an airplane to who sees our private information. In response to the devastating human and natural costs of under-regulated industries and corporate greed we have…a continued call for less regulation, and less money spent on enforcing the regulations that remain.
If we really cared about addressing real dangers we would have applied the trillions of dollars that have gone to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to developing and promoting renewable energy and fighting the effects of climate change. If we really wanted to make our citizens safe, we would be holding the corporate perpetrators of natural and human disasters responsible, and working to see that safety regulations were followed in a way that would prevent future disasters.
But we are bound to a national narrative that tells us that we can combat the bad guys by putting more guns in the hands of the good guys. We are tied into a story which is so dedicated to supporting the capitalist undertaking that while we are willing to give corporations the free speech rights of individuals, we aren’t willing to hold them responsible the way we would with individuals who had committed equally heinous deeds. We are quick slap the label “evil” on people who commit terrible acts, and even to extend that label to the religious or ethnic groups to which they belong. But we seem to just accept the fact that corporations will do whatever they can to maximize profit, and the costs that all of us must bear are somehow simply the price of doing business.
Sure, I want to know why the Tsarnaev brothers committed their terrible acts of violence. And I get that we are fascinated by the rare individual who commits unimaginable acts for unimaginable reasons. We already know why West Fertilizer Co., and BP and Exxon and so many others allowed terrible things to happen on their watch. And it is that prosaic, everyday pattern of choosing short-term profit over life and health that I find truly terrifying.
Spiritual Lessons from the Passenger’s Seat
Though she took the book learning part of Drivers Ed this summer, my 16 year old did not get her temporary license until last Monday. That’s because on Tuesday, we were leaving for a 1500 mile roadtrip for a family Thanksgiving, and it seemed like an ideal time to teach her to drive.
When I say “ideal time,” let me qualify that. To me, the “ideal” time to drive with her would have been after she had also taken the behind the wheel drivers’ ed class where the person in the passenger seat, a trained instructor, also has a brake pedal. But, oddly, that’s not how they do it anymore. They want the parents to teach the kids to drive, before the professional teacher ever gets into a car with them. While I find that bizarre and wrong, that massive group of people without 16 year olds seems to find it logical for some reason.
So, we headed off into the sunset, driving from Minnesota to northern Ohio. And then back. Safe and sound. With the sixteen year old driving at least 600 of the 1500 miles! And here’s what I learned, which I share thinking maybe it has application beyond this particular situation!
1. There is no time when beginning will feel safe, but make it as safe as you can. If you wait for safety, your kids will grow old and retire before you ever step aside and allow them to drive. But think through what will feel the safest to you. For me, it was a three lane highway in rural Wisconsin.
2. Start by imitating someone else. We drove around on a few country roads to experience starting and stopping, and then I said, “Just get in the right lane. No passing. Just follow whatever car is in front of you and go the speed limit.” That business of following someone else at first, even if they are the slowest, clunkiest, trailer on the road, is still a good way to begin.
3. Plan in advance how you’ll stop if you need to. Besides staying in the right lane, I knew that we would only switch drivers in wayside rests. No intown driving, no cloverleaves or complicated off-ramps. Just pulling over to a big parking lot on the side of the road.
4. Only do the one thing. In this case, it was driving. At first, we had no radio, no conversation about anything but driving, no eating. In the passenger’s seat, I did not answer phone calls or even look at maps. It was all driving, all the time, for both of us, until that was very comfortable and easy.
5. Consider challenging situations that might arise before they do, when life is calm. Talk about what to watch for in other drivers, to know when they might do something unpredictable. What to do if bad weather hits. What if a flat tire occurs.
6. Verbalizing things that you do intuitively will impress you with the complexity of what you know. In driving, as in other parts of life, there are hundreds of automatic decisions made. As we drive for years on end, we aren’t even conscious of many of them. I found it interesting and fun to speak out loud about things such as whether or not I trust another driver or when to pull back or when to push forward on the road.
7. Despite good planning, life will surprise you. We had planned for me to be back at the wheel long before Chicago, when we assumed the driving would get rough. But suddenly, on a country road that looked as if it would be clear and easy, bad fog came up simultaneously with road construction. There was nothing to do but live through it until there was a safe place to pull off.
8. Handling the unexpected situations well will give you confidence. After fog and road construction, I was more willing to say perhaps it would be OK to think about passing other cars, since that was much easier than what we had already lived through!
9. Take time to enjoy and appreciate progress. I probably told my 16 year old thirty or forty times what a great job I thought she was doing. And I meant it. But I could see that hearing my appreciation built her confidence and she was not annoyed by my repetition.
10. Plan to build on what you’ve learned. Now that we’re home from a highway trip, we’ll begin learning how to drive in town, which involves a whole different set of lessons. But the confidence from the road trip will spill into the local driving and make it easier.
Hope Springs: Vulnerability and Longing
Last night I went to the movie, “Hope Springs.” For those who have not seen the previews, this is a movie about a couple (Tommy Lee Jones and Meryl Streep) in a 31 year marriage where the thrill, as they say, is gone. It is about their journey towards getting the juice back into the marriage.
My friend and I were worried about being a minute late and finding a good seat, but we need not have been. The Cineplex theatres, which were packed for action thrillers on a Saturday night, were not sending too many folks the way of this film. As we walked in and looked around, we saw about 20 other viewers. Almost no one under the age of 50 was there. And it was mostly women in pairs or small groups, as my friend and I were. Divorced or separated women? I can only wonder.
The plot of the movie is easily picked up in a five minute trailer: This couple has lost their love, lost their erotic connection, lost their passion in the dull mundanity of daily life. The delight in the movie was in watching very good actors portray characters who dare to live through the pain and the longing for love. I can’t imagine any viewer who would not relate to the story.
As I watched the film, I connected in particular with the character of Tommy Lee Jones. A man who has hardened over, he can barely stand to speak directly from his heart. Instead, he speaks with cynicism, judgment, and disdain for all that is vulnerable and longing. Indeed, it is not until he comes to realize that his wife may in fact leave him that he becomes at all motivated to overcome his loathing for his own vulnerability.
Whether or not we experience this part of ourselves in intimate relationships, in our workplaces, or in our spiritual lives/ relationships with God, I suspect that many of us know it well. We have wanted something for so long, and never got it, that we can no longer stand to want it. It hurts too much. We shut ourselves down.
The gift of watching someone else live through this is enormous. I can’t think of another movie that has shown it so directly and completely. And, if Saturday night’s crowds are any indicators, people would much prefer to have the adrenaline rush of watching heroes battling monstors, space demons, and vampires, than watching normal people battle the fear of intimacy, the terror of connection.
I remember when my daughter was young, and wanted to see the last Star Wars movie. I had heard that it was very violent, and I refused to let her go. She had, I reminded her, had weeks of nightmares after seeing “Lemony Snickets,” a cartoon-like story about young kids who, after their parents die, live with a series of evil adults and must trick their way back to happiness. “But Mom,” she pleaded, “That was different! That was a realistic movie. I will never be a droid warrior!”
I was astonished. Snickets did not pretend to be realistic in any way. None of the characters resembled real people one might meet in life, and the plot was completely unreal. But for my six year old, the terrifying plot premise of being without parents was a real fear, and so the film brought nighmares. I wonder if this is why folks aren’t exactly lining up to see “Hope Springs.” They’d rather experience fears that in no way touch their inner life.
Not me. I’m delighted that people took the time to create a movie as deep as “Hope Springs,” and I’ll recommend it to everyone I know. Realistic? You’d better believe it! But what a gift to have the universal terror of vulnerability and longing safely on the screen in front of us!
Fear and Love at Tent City
There is a protest at Tent City tonight, the place where Sherriff Joe Arpaio holds thousands of immigrants in his self described ‘concentration camp.’ Where there is never any relief from the Arizona heat, where humiliation is a daily occurrence.
I’m with my people, in our bright yellow Standing on The Side of Love shirts that match the school buses that take us there, Unitarian Universalists in Phoenix for our annual convention. There are hundreds of us going, a couple of thousand maybe, mostly white, middle class, documented. And yet I am afraid.
I’m afraid because I’ve heard there will be counter-protestors, militia folks maybe, perhaps with the weapons which are legal to carry in Arizona. I’m afraid because it’s so hot, because I’m not exactly Olympics material in my physical fitness, because I am taking a teenaged child whose safety means everything to me.
And then, as we sit in worship and prayer, preparing to go, speakers from the local Latino community speak. A young woman describes her decision to commit civil disobedience, to be arrested by Sherriff Joe Arpaio, because she is tired of living in fear, of her whole community living in daily fear of being rounded up for real or imagined infractions and thrown into the Tent City, as they have been for the past 20 years. A young man describes arriving in the United States at age one, and now facing deportation –leaving the only country he’s ever known to be sent to one which is foreign to him.
And I begin to feel embarrassed by my fear. Not ashamed, not guilty, just embarrassed. As if I am a kid who grabbed too many cookies off the plate. And I think, this fear that binds us all, this fear of being arrested and humiliated and tortured in our own country: How does that hold us back? How does that diminish us? The young woman who chose to be arrested says, Yes, she was afraid, but she’s been afraid all her life. This arrest, in a way, freed her. I think of the words of the poet Audre Lorde, in her essay which is desert-island-essential to me, The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action:
What are the words you do not yet have? What do you need to say? What are the tyrannies you swallow day by day and attempt to make your own, until you will sicken and die of them, still in silence?
As we get into our bright yellow school bus, a minister offers a prayer for our journey. I say to the driver, Are we holding our departure up because we are standing up praying? And she looks up with some annoyance and says, “No! I am praying!” As I begin to lead the crowd off the bus, she says, “Thank you so much for doing this. My husband is in there.”
At Tent City, I don’t see any counter protestors, with or without weapons. I see a small gaggle of brave locals, who have come to thank us for being there. One woman I speak with tells me that her inability to pay for a traffic infraction landed her there for ten days. She describes the endless heat, the lack of adequate drinking water, the horrible food. She says then, tears in her eyes, “My girlfriend is in for a year.”
Another man holds a sign charging Joe Arpaio with homicide. I ask him how many people have died at Tent City. He says at least five. I ask him if his church stands up to speak out about this. He replies sadly, “I am still Catholic but I do not go to church anymore. Most of us don’t. There was one priest who spoke out for us but they got rid of him.”
As I get back on the bus to go back to air conditioned comfort, a shower and clean pajamas, his words stay with me most. I wish that I could have responded, in Arizona or in my own home state of Minnesota, “You would be welcome in my church!” I know that the Phoenix UU church is doing fantastic work to be welcoming, to stand tall as an advocate for justice for immigrants. And yet I know that, while we stand on the side of love, sometimes we stand too far off to the side, in our fear, in our privilege, buffered, unwilling to disrupt our comfort. I offer a silent prayer and wake up this morning with his words still piercing my heart.
(Photos by Jie Wronski-Riley)
Paying Tribute
In her best-selling Hunger Games trilogy, Suzanne Collins imagines a world of the future—a dystopian reality in which North American society has been replaced with a world where workers toil for the good of a small elite, threatened with the use of force, and given hope only by the small chance of winning a deadly game.
What makes the world of The Hunger Games so eerie is that we can see remnants of our present-day reality in it—enough remnants that it scares us to think that maybe, just maybe, we are headed down a path towards totalitarianism.
And while The Hunger Games is a work of fiction and of fantasy, we would do well to understand the signs in our current society that make Suzanne Collins’ disturbing imagination all-too-real.
In The Hunger Games, teenagers, called “tributes,” from each of the oppressed districts are forced to fight to the death in a reality television show broadcast throughout the nation. Their gruesome deaths are entertainment for the elite people in the Capitol, and the entire nation is forced to tune in and watch their children die.
That certainly isn’t reality, is it?
The reality is that our nation exists in what Chris Hedges, author of Death of the Liberal Class, calls a state of “permanent war.” Hedges writes, “since the end of World War 1, the United States has devoted staggering resources and money to battling real and imagined enemies. It turned the engines of the state over to a massive war and security apparatus.” We are kept in a constant state of fear that mutes dissent in the name of patriotism and fuels a war machine that benefits a privileged elite.
Our wars require not only a steady stream of money—taken from our paychecks and pockets and diverted from health care, our social safety net, education, and infrastructure—but also a steady stream of young, able-bodied people willing to die for our country. All too often, they do.
I am not suggesting that the death of US troops is entertainment for the elite, as is the death of young people is in The Hunger Games. But their death serves to reinforce a status quo that there are people whose interests are served by our nation being at war. The death of brave young soldiers helps us silence objections to unjust wars being fought in our name, it helps us dismiss Occupy movement as “fringe elements,” and it helps us rationalize police brutality towards non-violent protesters.
Lest we appear unpatriotic, those of us morally offended offended by the deaths of US soldiers stay eerily silent about what is fueling those wars.
We cannot afford to remain silent about the fact that corporations are profiting from this state of permanent war, and those same corporations have wrested control of our political and economic systems.
As we approach our annual celebration of Memorial Day, we will pause to mourn the lives lost in service to our nation. It is right and good to do this. Once we are done with our moment of silence, however, we owe it to our soldiers to raise our voices.
We must insist on a society where people matter more than corporations. Where the lives of young people are not used as disposable input into a system of profit-making and wealth creation.
We must insist on a society where political power is checked and shared—and not allowed to run amok through Super PACs and corporate donations. Where the wealthy and the poor have equal access and equal voice, where money is not speech, and where corporations are not people.
We must insist on an economy based in love and compassion, rather than fear and greed. We must insist on an economy based in mutuality rather than coercion. We must insist on a nation that treats the “least of these” in the human family as if they were the divine in our midst.
We must raise our moral voices loudly, my friends. We might not find ourselves in the Hunger Games if we do not, but to create the future we want to see we cannot remain silent.
