THE BEST GOVERNMENT (POLICIES, DECISIONS) MONEY CAN BUY

Mar 3, 2010
Howard
Uncategorized

Candidates for sale!  Policy positions to the highest bidder!

Executive or legislative decisions for serious contributors!  Serve a term or

two and welcome to the real money as a high end lobbyist!

Something I know about politics I learned in third grade!

My third grade teacher, Miss Roth – back in the era where flip-top desks (some with ink-wells!) were bolted to the floor in neat and orderly rows, where pull down maps and alphabets in precise penmanship poised above blackboards and dusty erasers, where students raised their hands and the Pledge of Allegiance added the line “under God” – decided we might experience a touch of democratic process if we had an election for class president.  Much to my surprise, more class clown than student, I was nominated to be one of two candidates.

Miss Roth announced we would have a “campaign” – as she worked to expand our limited glossary of political terms.  Each candidate, Richard and I, would announce a “platform” (word #2 in our election process lexicon), what we would do if elected.  I immediately proposed a five minute longer recess, just to get the ball rolling.  I was into it!  Jane and Nancy were really good at art, so I got them to make posters: Friend for President.  My dad had a collection of We Like Ike buttons and we used the reverse side of milk bottle caps to make Elect Howard disks to paste on the face.  My campaign seemed to be gaining momentum.  Victory was in sight.  It was Thursday.  The election was tomorrow.

Thursday afternoon there was a commotion just outside the front door.  Richar’s campaign workers stood by a large box – filled with candy.  Richard must have conned his brothers and sisters to fork over their entire Halloween take.  His cardboard carton overflowed.  Free candy. As much as you want.  Elect Richard for President.  After the frenzy, every student’s pocket was crammed with goodies.   And to make matters worse, where we arrived the next morning, same spot, Richard must have grabbed every stocking stuffer he’d ever gotten, no doubt conning his siblings again, the same crate overflowing with mini-puzzles and yo-yo’s, an array of playground balls and baseball cards, colorful balloons and magic tricks.  Gone in less than a minute.  Richard won the election handily.  (I later learned that Richard’s dad has contributed to the candy and toy budget).  Election finance reform was not among the phrases Miss Roth shared (that was decades away).

What’s changed since my third grade defeat?  We have the best candidates money can buy.  When lobbyists on a single bill, health care reform, outnumber legislators eight to one; when the health care insurance industry spends $34 billion on a campaign to defeat that bill; when the Supreme Court votes to protect and expand the right of corporations to finance candidates and lobby for legislation, can we have anything other than the best candidates money can buy?  When the banking industry spends $500 million on lobbyists in 2009 and the pharmaceutical industry spends $100 milllion, deftly divided almost equally between the two parties?  Making the best decisions money can buy!  Purchasing the best policies up for auction!

My good friend is recognized worldwide for his insight and wisdom on global politics and economics.  He teaches and has clients on every continent.  He is a Canadian.  Elections occur on a predictable schedule, or can be called more precipitously by the government in power, he explained to me.  But in either case, a candidate has a clearly defined season of electioneering with a specific campaign budget.  Corporate leverage is virtually non-existence. You carry out a campaign, articulate your position on issues, speak as persuasively as possible for your political philosophy, spend your budget carefully and await election results.

I have no idea, he confesses with disarming candor, how you can expect governance that serves the best interests of the people, when you have, name it for what it is, the best candidates money can buy. 

No Comments
Tagged , , , ,

THE POWER OF ATTITUDE – ANCIENT TRUTH (RE)DISCOVERED

Feb 23, 2010
Howard
Uncategorized

When I first heard the phrase, “you create your own reality,” I was resistant.  It sounded untrue at the least, per chance arrogant.  And there is truth in my resistance.  For some life seems (however unfairly) to follow a straight and easy course, few bumps or even detours, little adversity, minimal tragedy.  While for others one calamity follows another.  I find books like The Secret offensive, at risk of blaming life’s true victims.  But there is truth in the contention nonetheless.  Give it some thought.

For years, in a broad variety of contexts – seminary courses to adult education classes, counseling sessions to informal conversations, from pulpits to lecterns – I have suggested a formula for creative and proactive, effective and happy living: C + R = O: Circumstances plus Response yields Outcomes.  One could argue (more about that a bit later) that we have no control over circumstances, external realities, those situations in which we find ourselves.  These are “givens.”  For many: no equation, no formula.  “Que sera, sera” . . . what is, is; what will be, will be.  Make the best of it.  Be noble and stoic.  Delight when things go well; tough it out when they don’t.  As the brusque, per chance offensive bumper sticker puts it, “Shit happens.”  I must confess a quiet respect for people who appear to live nobly, resolutely, even creatively from such a perspective.

I am suggesting that how we respond to these “givens” – these circumstances that coalesce seemingly “on their own,” beyond our control – make a difference, per chance all the difference.  Our formula might expand to read: C + P + T/F + B = O: Circumstances + Perception + Thoughts and Feelings + Behavior = Outcomes.  Response, it seems to me, operates on three levels” (a) how do we choose to perceive these circumstances – are we seeing clearly, in-focus, or in blurred, distorting ways (remember the last time an oculist slid differing lenses in and out of that little carriage in front of your eyes, seeking the combination that increases or decreases clarity and focus), (b) how we choose to think and feel, processing internally, about what we perceived (among perhaps hundreds of thoughts and feelings, a “dominant attitude” edits and selects among them), and how do we choose to behave in response to our circumstances.

Perhaps the key words, the pivotal and defining words in all of this, un-highlighted by italics or quotations makes, are “choose to”.  Just as we may regard circumstances as beyond our control, we could well argue that perception and thinking and feeling are their own “givens,” even behavior of limited options.  I not only believe that, but I try to live life in alignment with that belief, that “attitude does make all the difference” . . . and it’s significantly, even overwhelmingly, a matter of choice.

St. Paul, initial interpreter of Jesus’ teaching and principle architect of Christianity, one can argue, challenged us to be aware where we “set our mind” – looking to what is lovely, true, noble and honorable, putting attitude into practice, yields peace.  He encouraged a hesitant young leader to “be called to a spirit not of timidity, but strength and might.”  An Old Testament proverb states it first in the negative, “what I feared came upon me,” and then in the positive, “as you think in your heart so it will be.”

A single bedtime story is the favorite of now the third generation in our family, The Little Engine That Could,” of  “I think I can . . . I think I can . . . I think I can” fame.  The first high jumper to leap above his own height explaining his innovative, upside down approach said, “I throw my heart over the bar and my body follows.”  Or a simple experiment no matter what your age (if you live near a street with a curb): Walk twenty feet along the curb without losing your balance.  If you look at your feet, you will become anxious and teeter.  If you look ahead, you will walk with perfect, confident balance.

Like St. Paul said: try it out.  Not just walking along curbs . . . but with everyday life.

No Comments
Tagged , , , , ,

AN OPEN LETTER TO MIR HOSSEIN MOUSAVI (COPIED TO ARCHBISHOP OSCAR ROMERO)

Feb 20, 2010
Howard
Uncategorized

They say a blog posting of more than 500 words goes largely un-read.  I’ll run that risk.  I

wish I  really could deliver this message directly and in-person to Mr. Mousavi.  He reminds me of

one of my heroes.  And heroes can inspire vision and determination, resilience and

courage, which I wish for this unlikely Iranian popular leader.

Dear Mr. Mousavi,

I do not know you personally and with media restrictions in your country none of us can know you well.  Yet I hold you in deepening respect for your clarity and courage, knowing that holding your truth and staying your course places you and your family at risk.  Ever since I first heard your story, a figure from history – halfway around the world from you and now more than a quarter century ago – keeps coming to mind.  I want to introduce you to each other.  His name is Oscar Romero, archbishop of El Salvador at the time he was martyred. 

The 1970’s in El Salvador were turbulent, a wealthy elite controlling the government and military, with substantial aid from the United States strengthening  that leverage, funding an apparatus of repression on a restless and ever more assertive peasant population.  The church was viewed as a “wild card” – with an important, often overlooked ecclesiastical reality true throughout Latin America: there were, in effect, two Roman Catholic Churches:  the official hierarchy, the priests of the large and often opulent urban churches, amply supported by the largesse of the hacienda owners and corporate class, headed by the archbishop; and, the so-called popular church, small chapels in small towns and rural areas with young, often radicalized priests, and an increasingly politicized peasant population.  Liberation Theology – biblical and theological reflection focused on the “liberating acts of God” foundational to the biblical narrative – had deep roots in El Salvador; and, Christian Base Communities were thriving – biblical reflection groups gathering in peasants’ homes who “found themselves” studying a Bible 80% of which was written from the perspective of the oppressed, the victims of injustice.  There was, at the grassroots, an awakening.

On February 23, 1977, Oscar Romero was appointed archbishop, a decision met with the blessing and delight of the landed rich and their patron government, but the disappointment and dismay of the popular church and its Marxist-influenced priests, fearful that a growing peasant community-organizing movement would lose its momentum.  Romero, known as conservative and passive, bookish and scholarly, would surely make no waves, no challenge the tightening grip of the establishment on the poor.   Less than a month after his appointment, his friend and Jesuit priest Rotulio Grande became the first of six priests to be assassinated over a two year period.  Romero is reported to have said, looking down at Grande’s bloodied body, “When I looked at Rutilio lying there dead, I thought, ‘if they have killed him for doing what he did, then I too have to walk the same path’.”

1979 was the critical and pivotal year in El Salvador:  The people took to the streets, the military and often more vicious and indiscriminate paramilitary and rightwing death squads, responded with relentless brutality, and Romero, as he stated on several occasions, “became converted by the poor.”  He began to speak out ever more frequently and boldly against poverty, school closings, press censorship, denial of public assembly, attacks on churches, and torture.  He began to develop an international reputation.  The Salvadoran government and elite were concerned.

On March 24, 1980, while celebrating mass at a small hospital chapel, Romero was killed by a single shot to the heart, just one day after a passionate sermon in the cathedral church where he had pleaded with Salvadoran soldiers, as Christians, to obey God’s higher order and to stop carrying out the government’s repressive human rights violations. 

2009 was a critical and pivotal year in El Salvador:  The story across three decades is complex, but on June 1, 2009 Carlos Mauricio Funes Cartagena took office as the newly democratically-elected president of El Salvador.  The unlikely irony is that the revolutionary movement in opposition to the ruling government in 1979, a government widely viewed as complicit in Romero’s assassination, was the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN) – widely viewed in the U.S. as Communist-leaning, anti- U.S., and a security threat to our country – is President Cartagena’s political party. 

In my reading about your country, and I trust I will be accurate and fair, the 1970’s were turbulent in Iran as well.  Am I remembering accurately?  Suspicious and alarmed by perceived ties to Germany during World War II, Britain and the USSR invaded your country to gain access to its railway system and subsequently replaced Reza Shah with his son, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi.  Wasn’t it 1951 when Mohammed Mossadegh was elected prime minister becoming immediately and enormously popular for his populist ideology, particularly his nationalizing of Iran’s oil fields?  How tragic (let me apologize if I may) that President Eisenhower, spurred by Britain, launched Operation Ajax, headed by Kermit Roosevelt – a relentless disinformation campaign, a massive budget to fund bribing public, religious and military leaders, and which succeeded in precipitating Mossadegh’s arrest on August 19, 1953.  Reza Pahlavi returned to power bringing rapid modernization but also swift and crushing attack on all political opposition. 

As in El Salvador (I am fascinated by the parallels) wasn’t 1979 a critical and pivotal year in your country?  Ayatollah Khomeini, imprisoned and then exiled in the mid-1960’s, led the Islamic Revolution, paralyzing the country and the economy leading to the overthrow of the Shah.  You know all too well the new constitution that yielded primary power to the Supreme Leader, an Islamic cleric, who controlled the military, the judicial system, police forces and radio, television and print media outlets.  The president, publically elected, had and still has limited and conferred powers. 

After the protracted Iraq-Iran War – in which you lost 500,000 to 1,000,000 persons, perhaps 100,000 soldiers victim of Saddam Hussein’s chemical warfare, in which my country has shameful complicity – the more pragmatic Akbar Rafsanjani and Mohammed Khatami, if I am reading history correctly, brought stability, greater freedom of expression, economic expansion, and broadened diplomatic initiatives, all without making a break from the ideology of the revolution.  The unexpected election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2005, I gather, prompted a sharp reversal of those democratizing trends, a return to hard-line policies, sparked by the incendiary rhetoric of Ahmadinejad.

Last year’s contested re-election of Ahmadinejad was widely covered by the media.  The brutal strategies of retaliation against the astoundingly massive and persistent public protests have circumvented government censorship and come to our attention.  Your courage, persistence and outspokenness and your steady encouragement of protest – as a candidate who only could only have run having been thoroughly vetted by the mullahs; viewed, like Oscar Romero, as “safe,” in alignment with the revolutionary agenda, one who, if elected, would maintain in-place policies.  Surprise!

Have you been “converted” by the people, empowered by their study witness, emboldened by their literally placing their bodies on the line?  Is there an “Oscar Romero in you”?  Your country has a legacy of pride, resilience and independence.  Speaking truth to power is hardly new for your people.  They need a leader like you.  I pray you not come to his bloody end and that change not take three decades.  Thank you for listening to my words of high regard, affirmation and encouragement.

In Solidarity and Hope,

Howard Friend

No Comments
Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

“HOWARD, ‘SPLAIN TO ME . . . I THOUGHT DEMOCRACY WAS MAJORITY RULE . . . ‘SPLAIN TO ME THESE ‘OTHER RULES’ . . . PLEASE”

Feb 15, 2010
Howard
Uncategorized

Imagine you are in a foreign culture and you suddenly have to explain, per chance defend, “the electoral college” – its history, its intent, its operation.  Easy to get tongue-tied.  You may articulate the concept, but its logic may be more elusive.  Upon the heels of that awkward task, you are asked to offer interpretation and rationale for “filibuster.”  Yikes!  You might explain its operation, but try to convey its importance.  Forget imagination.  Here’s some real live narrative.

I am just back from a month in Mexico.  Mexicans, especially in my son’s neighborhood, love to talk politics.  Even the peasants among them are alert and well-read, perceptive and inquiring.  And they just love to challenge North Americans.  Conversations over cervezas or a good tequila are predictably lively.  My exchanges with Jose, who lives next door, are always particularly vigorous.  He loves to ply me with a probing question, roll his eyes, and break into a mischievous grin.  A recent question resonated clearly, indeed awkwardly, with another from a decade ago.

 

Rewind ten years: Gore v. Bush

The extended presidential election process between Al Gore and George W. Bush, had recently, finally, per chance unfortunately been settled      . . .  by the Supreme Court rather than the ballot box.  “Howard, ‘splain this to me,” Jose pleaded (our robust exchanges are in what we affectionately call “spanglish,” his English on a rough par with my Spanish, neither close to fluent).  “Mr. Gore got the most votes, but Mr. Bush won the election.  ‘Splain to me, please.  I thought in democracy majority rules”

I tried to ‘splain the electoral college the best I could, his perplexed look mirroring my own struggle with what seemed an arcane and dated and, as my fumbling search for words revealed, distorting provision in our electoral law.  He was quick to admit that it is not uncommon in Mexico, as they put it, “to win the election but lose the count.”  But this was different, he sensed – accurately, I think.  Bottom line.  My country’s commitment to democracy had just exercised a procedure by which “minority ruled.”

In the years since, when occasions arise, Jose has not passed up opportunity to re-visit what remained an odd and seemingly unjust electoral procedure . . . “Howard, one more time, ‘splain to me.  Mr. Gore won the election.  Mr. Bush is president.  ‘Splain to me.”

 

Fast forward ten years: Senate voting procedures

Mexicans have been fascinated by the health care reform debate in the U.S.  Like the vast majority of developed nations (Mexico on the fringe of that demographic category) the irony of a system that spends per capita, or as percentage of GNP, more than any nation on earth yet delivers health care to its population so unevenly is an enigma.  That private insurance companies make billions of dollars in annual profit, can refuse coverage at their discretion, can deny policies to anyone with a pre-existing condition, have primary decision-making about financial re-imbursement is utter mystery to Mexicans.  That millions of people have no coverage at all; that people die for inability to afford life-saving, disease-combating treatment or medication; or that thousands of people are forced into bankruptcy by medical bills they cannot pay astounds them.  Jose made me most uncomfortable when he asked a most probing question, “Doesn’t this embarrass you, as an American?”  I am not given to sheepishness, but my stammering response felt for all the world like embarrassment.

He caught me by surprise with how current with the Senate’s deliberations he was.  “Howard, ‘splain to me.  Fifty-nine senators agree on a reform plan, while forty-one are in opposition.  The plan is defeated!  What happened to democracy, to majority rule?  And ‘splain to me this ‘filibuster’ thing, please.”  I gave it a good try, blowing dust off memories of my college political science course, gathering what I have learned from the more recent debate.  Jose interrupted.  “How can your government function if you need 60% of the vote to do anything?  Won’t it stop working?”

“I think maybe it already has!” I found myself reply. 

 

No Comments
Tagged , , ,

HEALING WOUNDS OF WHAT DID NOT HAPPEN — BUT COULD HAVE

Feb 12, 2010
Howard
Uncategorized

The title may seem confusing and this initial explanation may or may not help.  Tragedy, loss, crisis, trauma of any kind, particularly death are wounding.  In their wake there is need for healing.  But what of tragedy or trauma that could have happened . . . but did not?  You await biopsy results with the worst medical news a possibility – imagining the possibility of a dire outcome.  Even with the relief of good news, is there emotional wounding nonetheless?  Time passes slowly anticipating news from the surgeon of the outcome of a life-threatening procedure on a family member, your mind inevitably contemplating the worst, even as you hope and pray for a successful result.  You sigh with relief with word that all went well, but is there, nevertheless, emotional wounding?  My own personal experience, which caught me by some surprise, suggests a clear yes to this question.

As a pastor and psychotherapist, I have sat on numerous occasions with anxious parishioners awaiting a phone call that could bring unwelcome, even disastrous news.  I have watched with friends the hands on the clock in a surgical waiting room move very slowly, awaiting the surgeon’s entrance with news of how it went.  I have heard sighs of relief – “your tumor is benign” . . . “everything went just beautifully.”  And groans of despair – “your wife has four to six months to live” . . . “we did everything that we could, but we could not save him.”

When the news is tragic, earth-shattering, life-changing, and clearly wounding – whether as pastor or friend – you tend to the healing work to be done.  You “weep with those who weep” . . . you “bear one another’s burden” . . . you are “there” to offer compassion, consolation, a loving touch, whatever you can to encourage and hasten that healing.  When the news is good news, you breathe your own sigh of relief, share words of thankfulness, you “rejoice with those who rejoice.”  But is there also healing work to be done?

I speak not as a pastor or friend this time – but as father to my son, father-in-law to my daughter-in-law, grandfather to my grandsons.  At supper we got a call from our son in Mexico of serious complications following his wife’s (what we thought was a routine) medical procedure of the day before, and that she being prepared for emergency surgery.  My wife and I sat in stunned silence for three hours, awaiting his call with how it went.  My imagination – understandably, inevitably – anticipated in advance the ring of the phone and the voice of our son: “everything went well and she will be fine” . . . “dad and mom, she didn’t make it.”  Even as we waited, tears welled up as our minds ricocheted across that awesome spectrum of possibilities.  The call came.  Cautious optimism.  We flew to Mexico on the earliest morning flight. There were three more major surgeries, three anxious stints in the hospital waiting room, now all three of us together.  The surgeons later reported that “we almost lost her” in one of those surgeries.  I am thankful to report that Griselda is getting stronger every day, en route to a full recovery.

During our month’s stay, living this often anguished narrative together, even as the imagined worst outcome receded, as relief and thankfulness were welcomed, some deep wounding remained – which felt for all the world like grieving.  When we began to speak out loud with each other about it, we found common ground.  Griselda had not died – but she could have?  And the “could have” had deeply impacted us, the “imagined, though never real” had wounded us.  We found ourselves needing to “grieve the loss only imagined . . . but yet very real.”

Psychologists suggest that “unfinished grieving” of tragedy, loss, trauma and death experienced is common and, while it remains unfinished, is life-limiting, life-diminishing.  Might there be similar “unfinished grieving” to tragedy, loss, trauma and death that did not happen . . . but could have?  May I invite you to give that some thought?

No Comments
Tagged , , , ,

BACK FROM MEDICAL LEAVE . . . . . . . MY DAUGHTER-IN-LAW’S

Jan 23, 2010
Howard
Uncategorized

For those who may be regular visitors to my blog, you’ve noticed an unusually long absence. Some of you may know through other sources the reason why. After an initial surgical procedure, non-invasive with an anticipated short and easy recuperation, our daughter-in-law, who lives with our son and our two grandsons in Cuernavaca, Mexico, developed serious, life-threatening complications that demanded four major surgeries in less than four weeks. “We almost lost her,” the surgeon confessed, after the first operation. Later today she is scheduled to return home. Betsy and I have been “holding the fort” – shopping and preparing meals, getting a seven and eight year old to and from school, supporting our son and visiting his wife in the hospital. We are physically and emotionally spent. But deeply thankful that she will return home today. Thank you for your patience. The “wheels are turning” afresh, so renew your discipline of checking in at this blog site . . . and sharing your responses. Just below is my first post-leave posting.

No Comments

HOW BROAD IS THE GAZE AND WELCOMING EMBRACE OF GOD?

Jan 23, 2010
Howard
Uncategorized

Two Sundays ago I invited some members of our monthly inter-faith group to share, during our Sunday worship service, their tradition’s appreciation of Jesus.  The readings from their holy texts about Jesus were deeply affirming, moving, even adoring.  The Story of the Magi inspired the invitation, they likely Zoroastrians, who come to “pay homage” to Jesus but with no hint in the text this is a conversation story.  Many worshipers wrote to express appreciation.  But others wrote to express their dismay, their feeling that Sunday worship was not the right setting for words from other religions, and that I should have reminded all present that Jesus is the only way to God and eternal life. My pondering inspired this blog posting.

The massive and magnificent Baha’i World Center located in Haifa, Israel is octagonal in shape, a  magnificent door centered at each of the eight sides, one each for visiting pilgrims of the eight major world religions.  Visitors are invited to enter the temple, the presence of God, by “their” door – Jews and Muslims, Christians and Hindus, Jains and Buddhists and so on.  In fact, if I am not mistaken, one can become a Baha’i and remain an adherent of their present faith.  (I am a “quiet appreciator” of the Baha’i faith, but that is for another time).

Images coming to mind from identical passages that appear in early chapters of both Isaiah and Micah in the Hebrew scriptures, pilgrims streaming to the holy mountain of God, I imagine an aerial view of present day pilgrims entering each by their door at Haifa – an “outside looking in” perspective.  Each visitor, finding “their door,” chanting songs of their hymnody, with gestures and movements particular to their liturgy, carrying their holy texts, praying in the forms of their tradition, holding their faith in unique and singular ways.  Commonalities and differences.

Allow me a moment of blatant anthropomorphism, edging, I confess, on idolatry, daring to image God in human form, divinity looking and gesturing as you and I would.  My imagination dares an “inside looking out” perspective – yes, audacious enough to imagine looking through God’s eyes, aligning with God’s stream of consciousness, sensing God’s feelings, noticing God’s gestures and movements.  Some would argue that God turns only to those entering through a particular passageway, that the divine welcome is extended to only one line of pilgrims, that God’s arms open ready for embrace to only one group.  “Welcome to the kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of time” . . . “welcome good and faithful servants”  But what of the others?  “Throw them into the outer darkness, where there is wailing and gnashing of teeth” . . . “cast them into the sea of fire.”

I number myself among those who view God as brimming with delight with each one as they enter, by whatever door.  The divine eyes dancing with joy, the divine arms spread wide.  Rejoicing that each one – arriving by whatever path, guided by whatever practice, intoning whatever divine name, shaped by whatever beliefs – has made their way home.

A more earthy, everyday and real example:  Tracy (I have changed her name) arrives at The Gathering – our bi-weekly circle of silence and solitude, spiritual support, prayer and reflection – looking noticeably different.  No one failes to notice.  Lighter of step and of spirit.  An easy, relaxed smile.  Moving with rhythm and grace.  Something clearly different, it seemed wonderfully different.  Someone finally asks and Tracy responds with contagious joy.  She explains that recently come into the influence of an Indian guru, Amma by name (you may know her as the “hugging saint”) was attending satsang, a nearby gathering of followers of Amma.  Tracy struggles to find words, but her spirit speaks the message for her.  She says something like this: “Suddenly all that debris that has always cluttered the pathway between me and God has cleared away.  I have never felt more profoundly the embrace of God.  It is wonderful!”

Then, haltingly and hesitantly, she looks toward me.  “Howard, twenty years ago I joined the church you served as pastor.  I made a commitment to Jesus.  And, by the way,” she hastened to say, “nothing that has happened to me has diminished my commitment to Jesus.  But Amma has become an important guru for me.”  Then she asks, with disarming directness, “What does Jesus think about that?”  Yikes!  I pause, more briefly than I might have expected, and then respond.  “How dare I be so audacious to speak for Jesus” I confess.  But I will say this, boldly and unapologetically, “The Jesus-I-know is thrilled.” 

Jesus longed, it appears to me – he said it often, with such clarity and forcefulness – for those he met and touched, taught and healed “to know the Father the way I do.”  Tracy, more than at any time in her nearly six decades of life, is “knowing the Father” in a way that seems what Jesus had in mind.  Who could not smile with delight?

3 Comments
Tagged , , , , , , ,

PRAYER AS NATURAL ECUMENICITY – a personal experience

Jan 4, 2010
Howard
Uncategorized

Humorist, cynic, iconoclast, and social commentator Bill Maher said it most crassly, something like, “Would not human history have been better off if religion had not emerged across its pages.”  Whether warring   between each other or among each other, collisions of world religions have claimed millions of lives.  The aptly, sadly named “Thirty Year War” pitched Catholics and Protestants, intra-faith warfare among Christians.  The Christian conquest, then the sweeping Muslim conquest of Northern Africa and the Middle East, a succession of inter-faith wars.  The African slave trade and western expansion with genocidal impact on Native American populations carried out with Christian consent, arriving slaves baptized prior to stepping shackled onto the auction block.  A legacy inevitably re-enacted, as if by some insane repetition compulsion, generation by generation.  Sam Harris (End of Faith) names twenty-six wars over time, some extending into the present, initiated or exacerbated in the name of faith.  I write all of this as an ordained Christian clergyperson.  With sadness, awkwardness and a touch of guilt-by-association.

I am by nature a positive, hopeful person.  I believe there can be a better way.  I vision a world where adherents within a faith – mine being Christian – can choose acceptance, mutual understanding and high respect, even across significant differences.  And a world where those of differing faith can diligently seek common ground, shared values and principles, focus beyond that which divides to that which connects.  One might argue I being naïve, little evidence to support this vision I cast. 

A very personal experience in the midst of a family crisis has freshened that hope and shed a most promising light.  Our daughter-in-law, Mexican wife of our younger son, had a significant but not uncommon surgery two weeks ago and was apparently on track in her recovery process – when symptoms of severe complications surfaced.  Over the course of seventy-two hours she had two additional deeply invasive surgeries.  “It was close,” the surgeon later confessed, “we almost lost her.”  My wife and I flew to Mexico and have accompanied Erik and Griselda and their young sons through these anguishing, though now grateful days.  She will come home from the hospital in a day or two.

I sent emails to as nearly one hundred people – many participants in various groups in which we share membership, often groups gathered around common spiritual seeking – asking for prayer.  For reasons too lengthy to profile here, except to name my sense of blessing in it all, recipients of those emails included Egyptian Muslims, Iranian Baha’is, Persian Zoroastrians, a Pakistani Sikh, a Chinese Confucianist, Jews and Buddhists, Quakers and Unitarians, indigenous Nauhtls, Mexican Catholics . . . as well as Christians across a broad theological spectrum.

Their commitment to pray and individual prayers were expressed in a rich and broad variety of wordings, reflecting differing understandings of the Divine, varying understandings of just what prayer is or how it works.  But each prayer and pray-er shared a common focus – Griselda and our son and their boys and Betsy and me.  It was “lived ecumenicity,” a ready and unifying bond common to all, shared by all, expressed by all – undistracted by the reality of our differences, undiluted by varying theologies.

Hope does spring eternal . . . all the more profound springing forth in the eternal now!

1 Comment
Tagged , , , , , , , ,

A MORMON PROPHET IN THE (SELF) MAKING: Glenn Beck from another Angle

Jan 1, 2010
Howard
Uncategorized

Glenn Beck is a phenomenon. I’ve developed what my friends call an odd and masochistic practice of listening to Mr. Beck a bit each day. (I described our “meeting” in an earlier blog posting). Most days I have to fight myself not to hit the scan button, his ranting more than I can bear. I am not one to dismiss an ideological adversary out of hand, and I cringe when an ideological companion declares someone (like Glenn Beck) to be delusional, psychotic, just plain crazy. But it is all I can do not to join that chorus some days. Then again, just last week, as he quietly appealed to his (reportedly vast) audience to be trusting, hopeful and confident in a brighter future, I found myself on the edge of tears. Okay, I am fascinated, to say the least, by this phenomenon!

Let me offer a “lens through which to look” at Glenn Beck – a lens that had me sighing “aha” a day or two ago, and is making more and more sense as I think about it. Beck is a Mormon, a part of the “The Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints.” While in clear alignment with evangelical Christianity, proclaiming God’s love and celebrating Jesus as Savior, an official Mormon website adds that “God continues to speak His words and reveal His truth in our day through a living prophet.” (Mormon.org) The president of the Mormon Church is recognized as a prophet. But “On occasion, prophets may be inspired to foretell the future for the benefit of mankind” (Mormon.org). Is Beck posturing and positioning in the Mormon prophetic tradition?

Usually leaning forward, often cupping his chin in his hands, his eyes fixed on the camera, perhaps misty with weeping, Beck will quietly say something like, “Over the weekend some things began to become clear to me. I will be speaking about it in programs this week.” “Suddenly, it is all starting to make sense.” Is he suggesting that some sort of sacred revelation is touching him? That he is recipient of some divine message? Like a prophet? Just as poignantly, as if tears were authenticating, he offers words of assurance and comfort. “Do not be afraid. All will be well. You will be fine. You can live in trust.” The prophet as pastor? Or he offers clear marching orders, instructions about how and when to gather, carefully crafted values and principles to define and motivate the work. The prophet initiating a prophetic movement?

A prophet is defined, as much as anything, by a followership. One may lay claim to a prophet’s mantle, but only a cadre of the loyal, committed and devoted can birth the prophetic movement. Looks like a movement unarguably in formation. Hmmmmm!

2 Comments
Tagged , ,

I PARTICIPATED IN A DEATH PANEL . . . MAYBE ASSISTED SUICIDE . . . a good news story

Dec 28, 2009
Howard
Uncategorized

Did I participate in a death panel?  Did I collude with an assisted suicide?  Let’s see: we decided whether a man should extend life or prepare for death; we chose to discontinue life-extending medications and treatment; we vowed to forgo any interventions designed to prolong life, with potentially effective options at hand; we opted for a treatment plan with only comfort in mind.  In six weeks he died.

The “we” was a circle of seven: my mom and dad, my three siblings and myself, and, a representative from Hospice.  The “man” was my dad, whose physical and mental health was in steady decline, though his capacity to hear, think and reason, weigh and decide were clearly in place.  Though six of us, the Friend family, “decided,” the only vote that counted was our father’s.  Among the “potentially effective options” was a deeply invasive exploratory surgical procedure that may have, but would likely have not have, the doctors reported, been helpful.  Indeed, if it were successful, an even more invasive surgical procedure would logically follow, an assault our dad’s 94 year old body would surely not tolerate.

The “we” also included Hospice – a team of physicians, nurses, aides, social workers, counselors and clergy – and our parents’ health care insurance carrier.  All players on the “death panel” were in place, part of a process designed to be win/win – the best possible outcome for each and all.  The health insurance company, which covered all expenses for hospice, including a year of follow-up care for my dad’s survivors, “won” in terms of potentially costly extraordinary medical interventions being eliminated.  The hospice care organization “won” in terms of its services and its large staff, experts in assisting the dying and their families, being funded.  The family “won” in that a sensitive and supportive context for our father’s dying was in place.  And my father “won” as he had the departure from early life he longed for.

Six weeks later, on All Saints’ Day no less, our father drew his last breath.  Could days have been added to his life?  Quite possibly.  Might he have died in intensive care, tubes extending from his body, after hours and days of anguish for him and us?  Quite possibly.  Might he have had months, even years, tied upright in a wheel chair drooling on his tee shirt and staring blankly into space, holding my hand but completely unaware who I was?  Quite possibly. 

I have tried to make it crystal clear – in official and notarized documents, in instructions to my sons, in a reminder to advise any caregivers in any setting of my wishes – that I want a death panel convened as quickly as possible when my time comes.

No Comments
Tagged , , ,
« Older Posts