We need to show mercy

I have something to say that most people will think silly at first view... but bear with me. No matter who you are or what faith you are there is this certain thing that makes every one of us feel better and really feel loved. And it is portrayed to us in the movies about Jesus. He is the living embodiment of pure love and is so perfect and compassionate.. If you have ever seen one of these movies you know what I am talking about. Especially if you saw it as a child. Scenes in which Jesus steps out and does something really generous and loving and everyone is shocked and he has this look on his face like Hey I'm the son of God... and this is how I want everyone to act from now on... and the person that he just connected with and helped or vindicated or healed looks up at him with genuine admiration and gratitude... Because He Stopped and Helped them, because he was Kind. I remember as a kid actually tearing up and feeling great joy in those moments. Every person feels loved and helped when someone stops and takes time out to really help them. To look at them and See them. We are all the same person, no matter how different. In the end the maniac kills himself because he thinks that he cant be loved, the autistic child holds the mothers hand, the masked gunman asks to see his mother, the fundamentalist terrorist is discovered to be a porn addict... It all points to the need for love no matter how weird or unintelligible the scribbled line appears. We all want the purest being to look at our face and see a child, a helpless needy baby, and to coo, to bathe us in their smile and take away our sins, our pain our fear our need.... So the story of Jesus, no matter what you think or believe about him, the STORY of Jesus is there to help us Get something about how to use your heart because the world is merciless and We need to show mercy. That's why the story ends so badly. We have to look at atrocity to realize it is wrong. WE HAVE TO LOOK AT ATROCITY TO REALIZE IT IS WRONG. And still even after that he was forgiving. That's LOVE.

thoughts on compassion in light of recent events...

I have seen much written about mental illness in relation to the tragedy in Connecticut. I even posted a film commentary about prescription drugs being a useless panacea to really just make people disappear.... the blanket over the face of pain. I am one of the most Anti pharmaceutical people you will ever meet. I know Exactly what these drugs do to people. They take something away... slowly by slowly... and it is society's fault. We just don't care enough about people. I lived with the reality of drug addiction in my family and saw the same addiction translate to prescription nightmare. Nothing works for most patients. they just go from one script to the next. slowly slowly they fade away or remain in a static unwell place. I live with the sadness of not being able to connect and help my father, and other loved ones in my life because of drugs, and because of mental illness. This country is Full of people with major depression. Children, little little children with severe schizophrenia! Having the Will to EMBODY Enough Love to bring people out of their pain.... This is a mighty task, and incredibly difficult, I can say with deepest regret. No One is really teaching us in any faith or social group how to REALLY Embody LOVE in a way that truly connects us, and gives us Peace. We can all feel the fleetingness of that love... we can all sense that moment when our heart squeezes and our throats tighten and our eyes water...or those moments of exhilaration but how do we use it? We are shown how to hold our forks and pencils with our Hands; How to use our minds to think logically, put 2 and 2 together; How to pronounciate words and speak... but our hearts??? Our COMPASSION Training? It is religions job and they fail. It is a parents role, and they fail. It is society's role and it fails. Because Our media driven Hate culture has actually kicked and hit and punched and shrieked all of the compassion out of us... Think about Everything that you do for the next 72 hours and check out where you are coming from about that. It is incumbent upon us to become our own teachers, to reevaluate all our inner workings and to ask ourselves what kind of world do we truly want to live in? How do we create that one little circle at a time?

Being Human

The human being is capable of a range of emotions for various reasons.

Each is useful and should be honored and utilized with presence of mind and heart.

Even rage is a useful tool in the face of outright attack on ones person or family to protect life.

Even fear and caution should be honored for helping protect us.

Even grief and depression is useful to us.

It is helpful for us to all remember that we are endowed with our physical bodies
as gifts not hindrances,

and that the lessons we learn in life bring us closer
to what is truly spiritual in us

No Matter How we come to such awareness.

It is our individuality that we are given and our persistent drive towards Unity
that we must come to terms with.

How ever one does this is not for anyone else to judge,
Only to also learn from.

Shining a light onto someone in their times of need, that is the way of the Bodhisattva, the teacher, the enlightened one.

Each time that you can look into the eyes of your brother and see him exactly as he is and love him, (and to see yourself in this way as well)

that is the expression of JOY in its purest form, which is Unconditional Love.

What is your happiness based on?

The thing is, we are a culture that likes to have things, as Bill O'Reilly recently pointed out in his own ignorant way. We are Very privileged despite our growing numbers of those who lack... We're obsessed with youth, we love and cherish our Rights, we want our 1st and 2nd amendments untouched, we Believe in our right to the pursuit of happiness to our detriment (ie: ALCOHOLISM, DRUG ABUSE, porn addiction, plastic surgery, gambling addiction,etc... and we LOVE Toys. We are Hoarders to the most revolting health hazard extremes; collectors, gamers, hobbyists, and on and on. We love our things, our toys, and to us Everything is a toy in the pursuit of happiness. A Stamp, a coin, a CAR, a Twinkie, a Barbie, a newspaper, a big gulp cup, an old toothbrush, And A GUN. Many people have more than 1 Gun. As my last two items in the list suggest, even garbage, even useless things are treasures to the sickest among us who can't determine properly for themselves that their living room is not a garbage dump. And our world is a garbage dump with a depleted ozone layer because we all want our things to the point of extinction... doesn't the rat keep pushing the button until it dies? Yes, the rats kept pushing the button until they died. And we are not so far off. Toys and hobbies and pursuit of happiness? What IS Happiness? I ASK YOU. Is it possible in the wake of terror, in the wake of fear, murder, tragedy? What is your happiness based upon NOW? TODAY.

Some Brautigan for us all

Your Catfish Friend

If I were to live my life
in catfish forms
in scaffolds of skin and whiskers
at the bottom of a pond
and you were to come by
one evening
when the moon was shining
down into my dark home
and stand there at the edge
of my affection
and think, “It's beautiful
here by this pond. I wish
somebody loved me,”
I'd love you and be your catfish
friend and drive such lonely
thoughts from your mind
and suddenly you would be
at peace,
and ask yourself, “I wonder
if there are any catfish
in this pond? It seems like
a perfect place for them.”
― Richard Brautigan, The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster

X

no amount of bandaids
can repair this broken
perception.

An Open Letter to Pope Benedict From Sinead O'Connor

An Open Letter to Pope Benedict From Sinead O'Connor on behalf of all victims of child sexual abuse by catholic priests, on behalf of all catholic people, and all honourable catholic clergy, on behalf of every media outlet under the sun and on behalf of The Holy Spirit.

Sir,

Some burning questions arise from the following statement you made in your christmas address to your cardinals on December 20th regarding how it came to pass that the house of The Holy Spirit became a haven for criminals of a sexual nature.

"In the 1970's pedophilia was theorized [by the church] as something fully in conformity with man and even with children."

Here's a woman of significant real power. She's tiny, beautiful, brilliant, and she tells it like it is.

Here's a woman of significant real power.  She's tiny, beautiful, brilliant, and she tells it like it is.

She is not a head of state.  She's a writer (The God of Small Things) and an activist from India.  Listen to her, there's no way that you won't be moved. Everything she says is from her heart. You can watch her "Come September" speech on my youtube page.  The link is in the left corner of this blog page - in green.  In my powerful women playlist, under the title "wisdom" in 5 parts.  It is worth the time it takes to listen.  She makes me cry and yet she makes my heart sing. Knowing that this woman exists gives me faith in the future. She speaks for all the disenfranchised people in the world. She wants everyone to rethink what they believe is good and right. She reveals the secrets and little known or spoken of realities, that need to be seen in order to make an informed opinion about events and actions taking place every day in the world all around us.