Tuesday, October 7, 2008

Brian’s Reflection: Wednesday, Oct 8, 2008


It is time for us to turn to each other,
not on each other.


- Jesse Jackson, born on this day, 1941


I have forgiven Jesse for that tacky comment made about Senator Obama. All human beings are susceptible to envy, or to bitterness, or to projection. But his comment was helpful for one thing: to remind us how the Ego and the desire for recognition and glory get in the way of achieving one’s passionate beliefs and goals for humankind. Whoever it was that said something like It doesn’t matter who gets the credit as long as your purpose is achieved was on the money.

This is a time in the World where we are turning on each other. And the reasons are very complicated. I read and I read, and at times I am in utter despair that I simply can’t seem to grasp WHY we are doing this to each other! Something inside me screams to comprehend the Big Picture, to have some clear mental grasp of why we human beings are hating and destroying each other. I quite understand that’s it’s too simplistic to say greed or fear or …… whatever. But I have a real problem looming here. I have believed for a very long time in the Christian (and other religion’s) Myth that human beings are essentially Good, like the Mystery of God. Now, I am beginning to doubt. And this is very frightening. If I succumb to this, it means that I will have to change my whole idea about how I relate to my fellow human beings.

I have agreed to be on a panel, with three other clergy from differing Christian denominations, to talk about the California Proposition 8, where voting NO will uphold the California Supreme Court decision that denying marriage to same-sex couples is unconstitutional. The focus of this panel, I am assured, is to provide perspective and information, not to debate who is right and who is wrong.

I am determined to make this – at least for me – a moment in which I practice what Jesse Jackson says: to turn to each other, not on each other, in order to support the Gospel values of justice and of love.

Pray for me.
Brian+

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