New Cultural Story
My animal survival instinct and my human ego tell me that my life (and the safety of my family) is more important than yours – but my soul tells me that it is not.
There, I’ve said it. Is that raw enough? Doesn’t that really sum up the reason that we consider going to war? That we kill each other in the streets? That we continue to fight over food, economic policies…over anything?
If you have read my previous articles, you know I usually approach parenting as it pertains to my young daughter. Well, during the recent crisis in Syria, I have had many discussions with my spiritual, peace-loving, twenty-year-old nephew. One struck me as odd and we played it out until the wee hours of the morning. He, like me and so many spiritual people, has been praying intently for a peaceful, non-violent resolution to the Syrian situation. He has visceral reactions at the thought of us intervening in another country with even targeted attacks; and he is adamant in his agreement that violence would beget more violence.
On this night, we discussed our shared feelings that no “collateral damage” is acceptable, as well as our wish that there was a way to break the cycle of war to end tyranny. We talked about how past acts, like what is going on in Syria, that have gone unchecked by the international community have come back to haunt the world when they became mass genocide later. But we both, again, stated wishes that we lived in a world where there were other viable answers than more violence. We acknowledged that there are no easy answers and stated that we didn’t envy any of the leaders and their decisions at this time; especially given the thought about retaliation if our government did decide to act with strikes.
And that’s when he surprised me.
As the conversation turned toward the long-term effects of waging violence against others and what happens when we continue to anger the rest of the world with our interventions and potentially have aggression toward our own soil, his demeanor and attitude changed. He is all about peace until he feels his own safety and security threatened. He almost became hawkish as he talked about protecting our soil at all costs. I gently began asking him questions, trying (mindfully) not to make his opinions wrong, about where he draws a line of difference. He stated that this is “our land” and “our people” and so we must protect them.
I asked him what border makes it “ours.” Is it our lawn? Our street? Our state? Our country? Our continent or hemisphere? I even posited that, within my understanding of “We Are All One” from Conversations with God, to me, “our” includes every human on earth as an equal and undivided part of me. With this in mind, we either love and protect, to the extent possible, every person on earth equally or we give up that façade and we try a different approach.
See, like most of you, I don’t know the answers to these burning questions. I don’t know how to end violence in the world. I hope and believe that the spiritual and prayerful push of the last week and a half had an effect on John Kerry’s off-hand remark, the Russian encouragement, and the Syrian apparent acquiescence to a possible chemical disarmament (try to say that 10 times fast).
But I cannot walk around feeling that American lives are superior and deserve to be protected above other lives. I cannot, as much as I love my daughter, my nephew, and my husband, carry a gun to protect them at the cost of killing another person. I just cannot value one life over another. I haven’t fully decided where self-defense fits in with spirituality (although I have been confronted with situations in which I knew I would not kill to protect myself), but we have to start somewhere to shift the paradigm away from violence. Someone has to be willing to “put the weapons down” and talk…
…And intelligence and diplomacy have to stop looking like weakness.
In the end, I may not have changed my nephew’s mind about protecting “us” at all costs. But I am hoping that on some level I have helped him to begin exploring a new level of the concept, understanding, and application of “We Are All One.”
What conversations have you had with your young ones about the conflict between violence and love?
(Emily A. Filmore is the Creative Co-Director of www.cwgforparents.com. She is also the author/illustrator of the “With My Child” Series of books about bonding with your child through everyday activities. Her books are available at www.withmychildseries.com. To contact Emily, please email her at Emily@cwgforparents.com.)
Dear Therese,
Georgia here again. So what about the current state of affairs in this world? It is obvious, to me at least, that we are being lied to by so many that we have trusted to tell us the truth.
Take, for example, our weather patterns these days. Cloud formations that used to be rare are common place now. There is increasing evidence that the clouds are being chemically created. This brings us to two points. Barium and aluminum are being dropped on us something like 5000 times the norm. Just like gmo food, they are using us as guinea pigs to see the side effects. AND they are using the force of nature to the advantage of big business and government. I think they are purposely using these things to keep us scared and controlled. They are not using these things for the “good”. I think you would think long and hard about the effects of these chemicals if one of your kids was messed up in the head and the other other one couldn’t breathe bc of possibly being those guinea pigs.
We have the capability to manipulate something as big as the weather and it would be awesome. But now is no time to lay down and volunteer but a time to demand that we have a right to know what is being dumped on us. Because we lay down and take it, we are condoning to the “elites” that humanity has no value.
How are we to think of these things as spiritual opportunities??
Georgia
Wow! Georgia, I like that you are asking these questions! Putting the everyday reality into a spiritual perspective is sometimes very hard…almost impossible sometimes. Okay, I’ll give a spiritual explanation and some perspective on these things a shot here.
My thoughts: man can do just about anything. We can create and engineer even human life. Many think this to be a sin. Only God’s territory. As you know, I think we are all “gods”. (As CWG puts it, individuations of Divinity.) Engineering life, or engineering clouds, it isn’t about doing these things, but for what purpose they are being done. This, then, becomes a matter of individual and collective choice. Do I have a problem with engineered clouds being used to create water in a drought area? Or to recapture wasted water to refill the aquifers? No. Do I have a problem using them to cause destruction to profit big business and control the people? You betcha. So, personal and collective awareness is, as usual, the key (opportunity) to changing how we use our power…and that changes as we begin to view humanity as One. Realizing the butterfly effect is real. In Christian terms…what you do to the least of my brothers, you do unto me.
I would also urge you to keep open the possibility that at least some of these cloud/weather changes may be circumstantial, as opposed to insidious. Be very careful to avoid being sucked into the story of the way things are, and stay as much as possible in observing the facts (as you know them) of what you see.
Which actually takes me to the esoteric question of “why not”? If this life is but a continuation of life, and we really, as CWG states, have no life to lose, why not consciously agree to be the guinea pig to further the course of humanity? Why not volunteer?
Ahhh, there’s the key! We are NOT volunteering right now! But what if we were, for real, given that choice? Might that not change some things? Might life look more like an opportunity than it does now? What if we were told up front that there was going to be a section of this planet used to experiment on long term human effects?
Older people might volunteer to live in “chem zones” to give their children’s children a better life. Especially since much of the world is starving due to lack of rain for crops. We are sacrificing ourselves for far less noble things already.
Don’t mistake, please, that I think it is okay to be doing what they are doing, in the way they are currently doing things. Transparency…choice…is the key.
There is abundant room for changing how we look at life…and that’s exactly what this site is all about!
One more thought… An unfortunate statement about humankind is that sometimes the masses are so meek and compliant that it takes a “madman” to step out of the box…a person (or group of persons) who dares to even think something is possible! Now we sane, but outside the box thinkers, Spiritual thinkers, have (the opportunity) to either keep the madmen in check, show the madmen a better way (who he/she really is) or empower the masses. Or at least begin to en-mass allow the sane, outside the box thinkers/doers to not be reviled. Currently people are afraid of being relegated to the fringe of their families/societies/religion if they don’t stay inside those boxes. Portrayed as unpatriotic, heretics, crazy and or conspiracists. Make sure to look at your own views of others, and not disempower.
Georgia, in our search for a better way of living, we do have to be very alert to not falling into yet another power grab agenda masked in altruism. (Opportunities to Be discerning, careful, vigilant?) We must be careful of anyone who wants us to be fearful vs merely aware. I get the feeling that there are many agendas in play here, and many are proclaiming themselves to be the one and only “right” one. All of which means, to me, that we have to be “cafeteria Catholics” and pick what works from each, and figure out what is truly for the greater good…and create our world consciously from this point forward. Knowing that what works now most likely won’t entirely work, oh, two thousand years from now! We must now work the idea of change into our long term thoughts. The opportunity to create our own agenda…not all agendas are self serving and malevolent. We can include the thoughts of others and other ways.
On the subject of religion, and government, it is encouraging to see even the Pope and Rev. Pat Robertson changing their minds about homosexuality on even a minor level. The United States has made major attitude and legal changes in this area. This may seem off topic, Georgia, but it is all wrapped up in control…the ultimate control…of sexuality, and specifically the feminine energy….feminine energy and attempts to suppress it. Just look at television commercials geared for girls and toys for them. Absolutely ridiculous that still, in 2013, all the girl toys are make-up, hair playing with dolls, dolls to teach them how to be a mommy, brat dolls that are nothing but materialistic, fashion creating websites, jewelry making, hair extensions and color. Whereas the boys toys are geared around imagination and engineering!! We are “Madison Avenue-ed” into our roles from an early age. Warriors that are used to protect money and the status quo are called heroes and idolized. A woman who questions that status quo is a B word or worse…never spiritual, intuitive, peace-maker. The divine feminine is Mother, but not in the way it is currently portrayed. These times are giving us, I believe, our opportunity to create balance.
Georgia, the bottom line of what I am saying is that we do have control. We have control of how we think and feel about this world we live in. We can fall into the chaotic energies swirling about, or we can keep the perspective that we are the butterfly that can effect our world. We can become a conscious part of the collective, and influence that collective. We are being given many opportunities to choose how change happens. I believe we, as individuals, through our thoughts and actions, can not help but influence the direction of humanity.
Rudyard Kipling said it perfectly. (I know, I know, this post is getting really long, but I think it is an important topic!)
If—
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
(Therese Wilson is a published poet, and is the administrator of the global website atwww.ChangingChange.net . She may be contacted at: Therese@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
(If you would like a question considered for publication, please submit your request to Advice@TheGlobalConversation.com, where our team is waiting to hear from you.)
An additional resource: ChangingChange.net offers spiritual assistance from a team of non-professional/volunteer Spiritual Helpers responding to every post from readers within 24 hours or less. Nothing on the CCN site should be construed or is intended to take the place of or be in any way similar to professional therapeutic or counseling services. The site functions with the gracious willing assistance of lay persons without credentials or experience in the helping professions. What these volunteers possess is an awareness of the theology of Conversations with God. It is from this context that they offer insight, suggestions, and spiritual support during moments of unbidden, unexpected, or unwelcome change on the journey of life.
Right here at The Global Conversation and even across the globe, teens and adults are calling for a new world order. We’ve started to apply this in many aspects of our own personal lives, but what we have yet to do is to apply this in our cultural lives.
We want a New Cultural Story, and Muhammad Yunus seems to have the right idea on where to start. In a June 5th, 2013 article of The Christian Science Monitor, the recipient of the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize stated that the world is in need of ‘social fiction’ – that is, media that envisions better societies. If we create novels, television, movies, and the myriad amount of other mediums started telling of a better world (sounds like our New Cultural Story), then these ‘new patterns of thought’ and ‘new ways of living’ can reach the heart and soul of the people. Through time, as ‘science fiction’ seems to become more and more of a reality, it is also contested that such ‘social fiction’ (and so our New Cultural Story) can just as easily become our reality as well.
In an interlude of all the political and religious chaos of the past few weeks, I decided to post my shot at this ‘social fiction’. With some focus, awareness, and massive creative outpouring, what I ended up with was a piece of (hopefully) our New Cultural Story called “Spare Some Change, Mister?” in its unabridged form:
The final rays of a forsaken October sun grazed the top of the distributed roofs along the full stretch of Ashland Avenue. In their fading light, the rays smoldered themselves into the small cardboard signs scribbled in untidy sharpie and into the glaring neon machined to an untold perfection a few blocks ahead. For there was lower Ashland Avenue, and there was upper Ashland Avenue, and there was not a middle.
But there was a subway. A subway needed by the furious progress in upper Ashland, but not by the fatigued stench of the lower Ashlanders, which, though only the blatant disregard of the city developers to demographics, had owned the stop for the vital hub of transportation. The desire for cars was strong, but the desire of the City and the monopoly of the City on travel restrictions, were even stronger. And so every day the upper Ashlanders came marching through, day after day of strutting, swaggering, and vaunting their haves over their lowly conterparts. In response, the lower Ashlanders could do only one thing; sit there, but stay still, look dumb, but hopeful, have your cup out, but keep your head down, and NEVER ask for more. NEVER ask for more. And so was the interaction of Upper and Lower Ashland, of the Alpha and the Omega, of fortitude and destitute.
And then came that forsaken sun, whose warmth could not reach lower Ashland Avenue even as it extended its remaining heat. The streetlights flickered, on and off, on and off, giving a man squatting below just enough light to steal a glance at the luxurious passerbyers strut home once again. Within the flickering light, another Upper Ashlander strutted past, but this man was exceptional. The finest furs, the sharpest suit, the crispest manner in his walk. Perhaps his address was 320, 250, or even in 110, if he was that exceptional. But as that man, more than a man some might say, an empire, walked by the decrypted block of 6670. Without even raising a muscle in his eye, the squatting man began to speak.
“Spare some change mister?”
“Begging for change again? Is that all you miscreants of lower Ashland do? Day after day all I see is your huddled masses, your wretched refuse, bugging us pitying Upper Ashlanders for our money, so that you may squander it on streetwalkers and meth. It’s pathetic, and I simply cannot stand another sight of it. If it were up to me, I would blot Lower Ashland right off the map, and rid ourselves of your miserable destitute. Lower Ashlanders have nothing, do nothing, and are nothing.”
The squatting man looked up. He stared directly into the face of this man, this penguin of a man, clumsily waddling, pecking, and trying to fly.
“Don’t mind me sayin’ this, mister, but that’s not who I’s am.”
“Oh Really? Then, pray tell, who is that self you speak so highly of? But wait, you don’t even have to answer that one, because it is just so painfully obvious. You’re just another one of them, lost in the system of bad birth, genes, and location, aren’t you? And so, every day, you use your pity to use people. Isn’t that so, blaming the world for your problems, and yet you know that you’re just stuck in the desperate cycle that every reprehensible Lower Ashlander lives.”
“It’s deeper than that, mister. Who I’s am is more than what yo’se a seein’. Lookie deeper, mister, and tell me what yer sperit is a sayin’. ‘Cuz I ain’t seen anyone so lost as you, mister.”
“By God, I see it now. You’re one of those curbside prophets, spewing out verse after verse for the desperate, because they have nothing else. ‘The meek shall inherit the earth’, that’s a nice little lie you give them, a nice little radical idea. It gives them hope, and it gives you a spare dime. I give you credit, sire, capitalizing on righteousness to do the ‘Good Father’s work’. You probably don’t even have to beg for change, do you?”
The squatting man sighed. A long, deep sigh. A sigh so full of exasperation that it resonated against the shards of the few remaining windows that dotted the lower avenue.
“I ain’t a preacher, mister. But they’s are my people. They’s a good people, if they’s a given a fightin’ chance. They’s a just needin’ some help, more help than just what I’s can give ‘em. If they’s were given some help, somethin’ good, then they’s would be proud and strong, just like you, mister.”
“Why, you leftist freak. I see the red in you now! That help you’re muttering about is a distribution, of my stuff to your stuff. That’s what you want, isn’t it? Because life should be fair. And just. And equal. But it’s not. There are the haves, there are the have nots, and that’s all there is to it.”
The squatting man closed his eyes from the artificial blaze of the haughty leer above him. He inhaled, and took in every ounce of light, love, and life from the streets knew so well. He opened his eyes.
“Mister, I ain’t talkin’ ‘bout stuff here. I’s a talkin’ ‘bout people. People who love, die, and love again. People who dream, create, and wish to be a lil’ happy in this world. Tell me, mister, are you happy? Not with ya’ stuff, not with ya’ titles, but with who you really are?
The squatting man watched him deflate, watched the helium of years upon years of galas and corporate excellence escape the man’s fragile frame and lose itself into the wind. A long pause followed.
“No. No. I have done everything, everything, for this position, to have the means to be happy. I bout the penthouse, the exclusiveness, the luxury, but I don’t feel anything. All I feel is lonely, and so the only time I do to feel something is when I devastate Lower Ashlanders, because it is just so plain mean. So…No. I’m not happy. I thought I was happy, but I’m not. I want to feel that love, that dream, that piece of myself lost so long ago, but I’m out here all alone. Separated from those feelings, I feel nothing.”
“This is what I’s see, mister. Ya’ think that you’re all alone in this here world, and ya’ try pretty hard to keep it that way. But we’s all apart of a community, a big ol’ family that’s all reachin’ to share some of those feelin’s. I ain’t so different than you, ‘cept them rags ya’ wear and them stones ya’ got weighin’ ya’ down. Ya try and deny this by callin’ me a beggar, a preacher, a commie, ‘cuz you’re afraid our differences ain’t so different afterall. When ya’ get down to it, we’s a both just people, just lookin’ for some love, some life, somethin’ that’s far more than just ourselves. So see me in ya eyes, feel my love in ya love. If we be’s it and do’s it together, we’s a lot less lonely.”
The streetlights finally had enough power to stay fully lit. From its light, the squatting man saw a face that had been stripped of its mask of arrogance; one that had finally remembered what it was like underneath the endless day of pompous isolation.
“I.…I don’t know what to say. That sounds so….good. And it feels so….good. Can I give you something? Here. 10,000 City bank notes. It should be enough for you, and four our community of Ashland Avenue, our children of Ashland Avenue.”
“Thanks mister, but you already given me ya’ change. I think our conversation was just what ya’ needed. If ya’ feelin’ the sperit move you, ya’ be somethin’ and ya’ do somethin’ about. Farewell, mister.”
The squatting man rose from the ashes and walked away. The man of industry, bewildered by every little moment and every little word, stood there for a while. Slowly, he turned around, and started to stumble forward to a new Ashland Avenue.
As these two characters, seemingly different in every way possible, were able to have some (albeit extended) open communication and conversation, they realize that they can understand and relate to each other on a level that far transcends their differences. Though this is just a mere piece of social fiction, its theme is one that is right in tune with the direction of The New Cultural Story we all wish to create. Because once it is spread, reality is not stranger, but better, than fiction.
(Lauren is a Feature Editor of The Global Conversation. She lives in Wood Dale, IL, and can be reached at Lauren@TheGlobalConversation.com)
I invite you to watch a short video clip. It is only 31 seconds long. And after you have finished watching this particular video clip, which happens to be an advertisement for the well-known breakfast cereal Cheerios, I then invite you to explore your initial feelings and observations in relationship to what you just watched.
This ad has created some surprising controversy, and I would like to give our readers here at The Global Conversation an opportunity to weigh in on your thoughts and opinions surrounding this advertising campaign.
What do you think?
What do you feel?
Does anything strike you as odd or offensive?
I heard about “the controversial Cheerios commercial,” and I have to tell you, before reading the story behind the firestorm, I watched this video clip two or three times and STILL could not figure out what the commotion was all about. When I went on to read an article about the negative reaction this video prompted from a segment of our world’s population, I felt as though I stepped back in some peculiar and unforgiving time machine.
Cheerios’ portrayal of a bi-racial couple, an African-American father and a Caucasian mother, both parents to a young mixed-race daughter, received so many negative and racist comments on YouTube — references to ‘Nazis’ and ‘troglodytes’ and ‘racial genocide’ – General Mills, the parent company of Cheerios, elected to disable the “comments” section underneath the video.
With as much progress and forward movement we have made as a society, how is it possible that there are still so many people who haven’t progressed and who haven’t moved forward? Maybe I am naive, but I continue to be transported to a place of disbelief, oftentimes simply having no words to express, when I hear of or stand witness to human beings who not only judge but actually interfere in the well-being of another based on what they look like, how they talk, how old or young they are, how fat or skinny they are, who they love, how they wear their hair and like to dress, what kind of house they live in, how much money they have, who they like to have sex with, what color their skin is, etc.
When you watched this video, did you feel anything but affection and sweetness? Contentment and warmness? And maybe a sudden hunger for a bowl of Cheerios?
Actor Charles Malik Whitfield, the man who plays the African-American father in the ad, supports the Cheerios ad wholeheartedly and recently spoke about it.
“As an actor who happens to be African-American, I am very proud to be part of the forward-thinking Cheerios commercial produced by General Mills. I believe it represents what America stands for – regardless of race, creed or sexual preference. To all of the wonderful people who have supported this heart-warming and very adorable commercial, I applaud you all,” Whitfield said.
In a statement to ABC News, Camille Gibson, the VP of Marketing for Cheerios said, “Consumers have responded positively to our new Cheerios ad. At Cheerios, we know there are many kinds of families and we celebrate them all.”
Well, today, I celebrate you, General Mills, for being at the forefront of a New Cultural Story in our world. Not only does it make me want to buy Cheerios, it makes me just simply want to be more loving, more compassionate, more accepting, and more aware than I have already declared myself to be.
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
“I, Tina, take you, Tony, to be my husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish; from this day forward until death do us part.”
Couples around the world, thousands of them, on the threshold of entering into life partnerships with each other, commonly recite these traditional vows. And while there is nothing “wrong” with these particular words, or their meaning, I wonder how much thought or consideration is given to whether or not these declarations actually reflect the highest level of their commitment, the deepest expression of their love, and the clearest intent and very purpose for entering into the relationship to begin with.
I don’t think I would be too far off the mark by making this perhaps bold statement: These same couples, thousands of them, have no idea why they are entering into their relationships to begin with, nor do they have any understanding of where they are going. The fallout is demonstrable and inarguable as we continue to witness growing numbers of painful divorces and separations – or, for that matter, perhaps even a larger number of people staying in relationships that either no longer serve them well or have become downright harmful. That is not to say that longevity is the sole indicator of the value or worthiness of a relationship. We could probably all share an experience where in a fleeting relation with another we were provided us some of our most profound remembrances and realizations, demonstrating the idea that ALL relationships create a context within which we are given an opportunity to choose and decide Who We Really Are.
However, as our world gently transitions out of its Old Cultural Story and into its New Cultural Story, we are given another opportunity, perhaps an even grander opportunity, the opportunity to redefine and recreate our relationships with each other not only on a global scale — politically, socially, and economically — but individually, within our most intimate relations and interactions. This shift holds within it the gift of change and the awareness to create. And the most beneficial place to begin is, quite frankly, at the beginning.
This change is not always obvious or easy. We are constantly barraged with mind-numbing television programs which degrade the holiest of unions by exploiting brides who behave poorly or by aggrandizing extraordinarily decadent and over-the-top weddings or whom offer us the advice of “relationship experts” who tell us the way our relationships “should” be. As a result, for so many, more energy and thought is expended on the pomp and circumstance of the wedding event than is given to the actual commitment.
People spend more money on multi-tiered designer wedding cakes than they are able to practically afford in order to please their guests, a large majority of whom they don’t even know. Women starve their bodies for weeks in an effort to fit into a wedding dress one size smaller than they naturally and comfortably fit into. We smash cake in each other’s faces, we pollute ourselves with so much alcohol that we can barely even remember what took place, and we, as I earlier mentioned, allow the very first words that we utter as an expression of Who We Are to be something we cut-and-pasted from Google.
If we are going to change everything, and reconnect to the intended purpose for our relationships, where do we begin? What kind of an experience would a “ceremony of commitment” or a “declaration of unity” under The New Spirituality present itself as? What would a couple in love, being love, expressing love offer at the dawn of their relationship as a declaration and demonstration of a spiritual partnership that would exemplify the very reason they have chosen to unite in the first place?
Conversations with God, Book 1, Chapter 8, offers to us the following:
“If you both agree at a conscious level that the purpose of your relationship is to create an opportunity, not an obligation—an opportunity for growth, for full Self expression, for lifting your lives to their highest potential, for healing every false thought or small idea you ever had about you, and for ultimate reunion with God through the communion of your two souls—if you take that vow instead of the vows you’ve been taking—the relationship has begun on a very good note. It’s gotten off on the right foot. That’s a very good beginning.”
What would you, from within the framework of your own understanding and your own experience, offer to someone who has come to you seeking a new definition and a new experience of “happily ever after”?
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
Pope Benedict XVI said, no, we are not in his annual Christmas message to the world, one of his most important speeches of the year, where he once again proclaimed that same-sex marriage is destroying “the essence of humanity.”
“People dispute the idea that they have a nature, given to them by their bodily identity, that serves as a defining element of the human being,” he said at the Vatican. “They deny their nature and decide that it is not something previously given to them, but that they make it for themselves.”
He further went on to say, “When freedom to be creative becomes the freedom to create oneself, then necessarily the Maker himself is denied and ultimately man too is stripped of his dignity as a creature of God.”
Could it be, as Pope Benedict suggests, that life truly is a shallow existence of “what you get is what you get”?
What would the Pope tell a child born a hermaphrodite, a condition in which someone is born with both female and male sex organs – a body given to him by God, by the way? Too bad? You deserve no one? Or perhaps the contrary: “Lucky you, you can have a relationship with whoever you want”?
And what about the Pope himself who has been “defined” by God as a male, given a penis, and yet chooses not to fall in line with that “identity” and chooses not to express romantic love to a female and chooses not to enter into intimate relationships? According to his own definition, is he not “denying” his own “nature” that God intended for him to share in intimacy with a woman and to reproduce? Is he not participating in his own freedom and creativity in an effort to self-define who he is and what he believes about why he is here?
Aren’t we ALL doing that very same thing?
Why are we being told to feel bound to our physicality when it comes to S-E-X, but celebrated when we demonstrate our capacity for greatness beyond our bodies in other ways?
My friend, Mark, whose body is partially paralyzed and riddled with unrelenting pain – again, the body given to him by God — climbed 108 floors of the Sears Tower in Chicago…and plans to do it again this year. I imagine it would be quite difficult to find anyone who would say Mark has “stripped himself of his dignity” by creating a new definition of himself that expanded far beyond his physicality.
But again, I get it. We are talking about the unspeakable, the shameful, the only-talked-about-in-a-whisper topic of S-E-X.
However, the Pope’s declaration of “Gay marriage, like abortion and euthanasia, is a threat to world peace” appears to be falling upon deaf ears as the Constitutional Court in largely Roman Catholic Spain upheld the law legalizing gay marriage last month, the British government announced it will introduce a bill next year legalizing gay marriage, and in France, President Francois Hollande has said he would enact his “Marriage for Everyone” plan within a year of taking office last May.
These are the visionaries, the writers of our New Cultural Story, the mold-shatterers and rule-breakers who do not believe in a God that makes mistakes. They are not buying into the twisted idea that God would create something so extraordinary and then make it wrong.
What these New Cultural Story global authors do believe in is Love. They do not believe same-sex marriage is destroying the essence of humanity, but rather that it IS the essence of humanity. They believe that love transcends everything and is denied to no one, that Love that has no rules and is certainly not reserved for only a select few to be experienced in a select way, and that the biggest continuing threat to world peace is not found, as Pope Benedict suggested, within the loving union of a same-sex partnership, but rather in a belief system that embraces and promotes a vengeful and judgmental God.
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team atwww.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
We are not a Godless society–that would be impossible. God, as we call the source of which we come, is All, Everything. Nothing would exist if there were not God/Source (whatever you call your personal belief system of our Creator). Now, being given Free Will and CHOOSING to forget that we are complete Love because God/Source exists is quite another thing altogether.
“If a madman wants to kill innocent people, he will find a way.
Killers don’t need guns to kill people.
Timothy McVeigh used fertilizer.
9/11 terrorists used box cutters and planes.
Nazis used cyanide gas.
Taking guns from innocent people will not protect innocent people.
The problem is NOT guns, it’s the Godless in a society.”
This quote comes from Facebook. I’ve noticed a number of people posting this since the massacre this last week. What is surprising to me is a lot of people are acting as if this massacre is the surprise. We have had so many senseless public murders that I’m losing track of them all. I know you are, too. Yet each time one happens, we pretend it’s the first time and are shocked it’s happened.
We are not living in a world that is Godless, without God. No, my friends, we are not. It just appears that way because WE ARE THE ONES WHO HAVE FORGOTTEN WHO AND WHAT WE ARE. Events like this are our opportunities to show ourselves who we really are. This is where we get to show that we can love EVERYONE, including the shooter because we hold so much compassion in our hearts.
God created us with a veil so that we have forgotten what we really are, LOVE AND LIGHT. We are here experiencing our pure spirituality as humans. We are not humans having an occasional spiritual experience. No, it’s the opposite. We are spiritual beings having a human experience; to feel what duality feels like. Love/hate, clarity/confusion, black/white, etc. Without this duality, we don’t know what we are. If you don’t have a room with objects in it, you have nothing to show you what you are in relationship to anything.
I know you’re thinking, crap, she’s off on her “love and light” and “God” baloney again. But keep your mind open, because it’s things like this last week and the multiple other shootings and murders that we think are the problem. The problem is us, our way of believing and thinking.
We watch the news over and over and wonder why we feel so exhausted. We build brick walls around our heart and create grievances against the shooter. Grieve, for sure, but then what are you going to do about your feelings? Are you going to volunteer to help the mentally ill? Are you going to volunteer at schools so those who feel ostracized are given attention? Are you going to keep your stories that people who are bullies should be bullied by you? Are you going to keep your stories that you don’t have time? What about the story it’s someone else’s problem to solve for you? Then you can create even more stories that those people are letting you down, too. Do you choose to NOT hear the cries for help BEFORE it becomes a national crisis? Do some soul searching and find out why you keep burying your head in the sand instead of stepping forward and doing something, anything. Anything but complaining and creating more stories of why you can’t. Why can’t you? What is holding you back? I know who: you. You are holding YOU back from saving the world. It takes all of us. We all helped in this mess and we all need to stand up and do whatever it takes to make it better.
We are sitting around waiting for our creator to come save us, yet we NEVER LISTEN to the messages that are giving to us continually on how to solve the plight WE CREATED for OURSELVES.
We either don’t believe in God because of all the negativity we believe is around us or we lament that God is not saving us. Well, you can’t be given free will and then say, “Nope, not this time, I don’t want free will, I want you to take care of me. However, when I think it’s convenient, I want the free will back.” This is just another way of humans creating some bizarre story around God so they can say God is letting them down. We are nuts.
Soon as you take that first breath of life, my dear ones, you got free will. What you CHOOSE to do with that free will is how you either consciously or UN-consciously choose to live your life and show yourself and all others who you really, truly are.
Are you one who thinks someone else should protect you and take care of you? Are you the one who offers to assist others without a story attached? Can you actually really truly do something for another and NOT SAY “except” this or that?
No, we don’t live in a world that is Godless or where God doesn’t not listen to us. In fact, there are many beings who we are not aware of, other beings that are watching over us with much compassion, love and concern for us and our choices. We can believe in the devil, but let’s not believe there are beings concerned with our well-being. That would be totally absurd. Only our old cultural stories are true, there is nothing we are missing or don’t know. Right.
Where we are stuck is in our fear. I read and hear all this talk of how the shooter should still be alive so we can torture that person even more than they were tortured living in their own mind while there were here on earth. Where is the compassion for how horrible his life must have been? And where is the compassion for all you who would hate someone in so much more pain than you? Can you not reach inside and if you feel this much pain? Imagine how another would hurt so deeply to do something so horrendous. Yes, this is the story that I’m telling myself because I feel so deeply in my heart that as horrific as this is, this is the spot where you, personally, begin your path to open up your heart instead of building a thicker wall from your fear.
Can you honestly believe that God would not love this person who has done this terrible thing? Do you really think God would not have compassion knowing the complete story that we don’t know? Why do you suppose you believe you can build that armor around your heart and then believe you could possibly understand the reasons why this occurred? How do you come to your conclusions you understand a loving Creator when you identify with your hate and anger so much? How can you open you heart to feel God’s messages when you have this wall around your heart?
Do you really think the hell this person was living here on earth should be punishable by even more hell from God? No. I think the God I desire would have so much love for this person because the source of our creation knows all and understands much more than we do, the whys of all this, that there is redemption. Our Creator has total understanding, love and compassion for this person. This person does not deserve more anguish, and neither do you.
We are living behind a veil of forgetfulness of who we are. And until you stop and face your fears and anger, you won’t be conscious enough to be choosing to love. You’ll continue in your stories, justifications and grievances that you are right and everyone else who doesn’t say they believe like you are wrong. The evil is your ego. Let go of that ego. Open up to the possibility that our cultural story is wrong. What you believe and how you justify your negative beliefs isn’t really happening at all. You are choosing hell on earth, my friends…you.
This is not for us to lament God is not saving us. This is not about gun laws. This is about YOUR CHOICES. You want a better world? Stop bringing all these negative thoughts with their stories to us. Change your words to positive outcomes. Believe there is love, because once you start looking, it starts growing. . .
I know these murders are horrific. My heart just aches for us all. But on the other hand, I see this as such an opportunity for us to open our hearts with love and change our story. Change our story in such a way that it isn’t about just the families of the children or the families of the shooter, but to include the shooter and include you, too, for all the pain and walls around your heart.
There will be many more senseless deaths in the years ahead unless we consciously change our story. . .and we can, person by person, sending love and light and prayers to all:
Prayer by St. Francis of Assisi:
Lord, Make me an instrument of they peace,
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury; pardoned;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
Where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master, grant I may not so much seek
To be consoled as to console,
To be understood as to understand,
To be loved as to love,
For it is in giving that we receive,
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
It is in dying to self that we are born to eternal life.
(Trisha lives in Tooele, Utah. She is an avid reader, enjoys meditation and enjoys the walking on the desert trails in her area. She writes several blogs. She gets a kick out of sharing what she is learning about why we are here and what and how we are creating together.)
…for a candidate whose platform does not emulate my highest thoughts, core beliefs, and creative visions for our world.
I WILL be voting for someone who will champion the type of change that benefits not just a select few, but ALL of humanity. The inclination I feel towards one candidate or another has less to do with issues of money and more to do with freedom, choice, and compassion.
I WILL be voting for the candidate who will tirelessly fight on the side of same-sex couples who desire the same benefits and recognition afforded to heterosexual partners in marriage, someone who will pave the way for gay couples to be afforded an equal opportunity to freely demonstrate their love and commitment both legally and socially.
I WILL be voting for a candidate who understands and supports freedom of choice and promotes women’s health, empowering women to make their own decisions regarding whether or not to have sex, whether or not to use contraception, and whether or not to deliver a child into the world.
I WILL be voting for the candidate that holds the beauty and life-sustaining bounty of our world in the highest regard, enacting laws that protect and nurture our planet earth, creating revitalization in areas that have been depleted or abused, and steadfastly guarding our most precious resources.
I WILL be voting for the candidate who recognizes the importance of affordable and sufficient healthcare, someone who develops and offers programs which enable those whose lives are less than easy to receive medical care and compassion, regardless of age or socioeconomic status.
Will it make a difference when I throw my spiritual hat in the political arena and cast my vote?
I believe YES.
I believe that every problem has a spiritual solution. And I further believe that not only do we all have the ability to recreate ourselves anew within the context of our personal relationships, the ones we hold as intimate and most cherished, but we also have the ability to recreate our world anew through the collaboration of our collective thoughts and an elevation of global consciousness.
We are all in relationship with each other. We are not separate. What you think does matter. Your vote does count. And what you choose will make a difference.
YOU are the author of the New Cultural Story…What will you write?
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
Thank you, France, for demonstrating that, YES, our world IS evolving and moving towards a more loving and accepting society, breaking through the intolerant barriers of an Old Cultural Story which dictates in what form love is to be experienced and expressed and moving into a New Cultural Story where couples of all genders are free to experience and enjoy the rights and privileges afforded to ALL loving relationships.
According to a recent article in The Telegraph, “France is set to ban the words “mother” and “father” from all official documents under new plans to legalize gay marriage,” giving equal adoption rights to homosexual and heterosexual couples.
Justice Minister Christiane Taubira told France’s Catholic newspaper, La Croix, “Who is to say that a heterosexual couple will bring up a child better than a homosexual couple, that they will guarantee the best conditions for the child’s development?”
As expected, this proposed law is being met with vehement resistance by members of the Catholic Church. “Gay marriage would herald a complete breakdown in society,” Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, the head of the French Catholic Church, told Christian’s RFC radio last week. He is further quoted as saying, “This could have innumerable consequences. Afterward they will want to create couples with three or four members. And after that, perhaps one day the taboo of incest will fall.”
Wow, is the suggestion really being made that the legalized union of two loving same-sex mutually consenting adults is one step shy of a parent engaging in sexual relations with their own child or brother or aunt? And perhaps I’m confused, but isn’t it heterosexuals who have been historically, and still are even to this day, entering into multiple-partner relationships? What does THAT type of irrational conjecture have to do with a same-sex partnership being afforded the opportunity to be a legally and socially recognized union?
And just WHEN and HOW did God’s glorious gift of sex become a tool to be used to judge, control, manipulate, bring shame upon, and condemn? Do we honestly imagine a God who created the possibility of deeply felt love to exist between two souls – whether that is a man and a man, a woman and a man, or a woman and a woman – only to then be judged and punished for simply being who they are? What is it that we are actually afraid of here?
I applaud this bold step forward the country of France is proposing, a step that embraces the forward movement of The New Spirituality and celebrates everyone’s ability to enter freely and fully into a legally recognized union that supports at an equal level the depth of their love and the holy union of their souls.
