In March of 2017, I wrote a letter. My letter was in response to one I had received from someone close to me. I have done a bit of editing to in the interest of addressing a wider ‘audience’ and to bring a few things up to date in terms of current events.

There have been many, many discussions over the years about religion and spirituality, sifting through our doubts and experiences, the ongoing search for a path to Truth. As I understand them, the teachings of Jesus are about Love – the fiercest, most unconditional, transcendent type of Love. They are about how to live in such a way that would bring peace to our neighbors, develop love in our hearts and a close spiritual relationship with God. I believe that Jesus would have wanted us to protect all of God’s creation and he was well-known to be a friend to the downtrodden and the outcast. There are many Christians who are doing good work to create a wholistic, supportive, and accepting community. This post is not about them, the ones who are the healers and the peacemakers, who are much needed and greatly appreciated.

There’s been a whole lot of Christian flag waving these past several years. There’s a whole lot of touting Christian values. How are these teaching being made manifest in our society and the world today? Because for so many the so-called Christian values have gotten so intertwined with the so-called Conservative agenda, there’s a way whole lot of all of these things being used as excuses to discriminate, to instill fear and spread hate; to treat others as less than, to re-enforce separation between all the various groups of people in this country. I have to marvel at how much the politics and religiosity are antithetical to each other. 

It takes a lot of work to fight for opposing ideas every day.

It seems like there’s such a big dis-connect – our society is so dis-integrated.

The level of hypocrisy in this country has reached an all-time high.

And, for all the complaints about how Christians have been persecuted in this country, there sure seems to be a great lack of hate crimes against them – unlike the Jewish cemeteries that have been desecrated and community centers that have been threatened, the Native Lands stolen and bulldozed under, the Mosques that have been attacked, the Sikhs and other Indians that have been killed by ignoramuses that don’t know the difference between a Sikh or an Indian or a Muslim (not that anyone should be sought out and killed), Orlando. The over 1,300 black citizens that are killed each year in law enforcement encounters “gone bad;” Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor and George Floyd being the most recent people to draw the headlines. The on-going empowerment of hateful speech and actions easily reaches a fever pitch. 

Here’s the thing. These are tough times. There’s a lot going on in the world and, given that it is human nature to be tribal, I understand that people are unsettled, uncertain and maybe feel their ‘way of life’ is being threatened in both real and imaginary ways. The recent quarantine due to the Corona virus pandemic and the attendant fallout socially and economically as well as the strain on the healthcare system has complicated everything … and exposed some major failings on the part of our systems of business and government. The instinct is to circle the wagons, and hold tighter to one’s own belief systems, and get ready to fight.

Our spiritual values should and can feed our souls and make us more loving, less ego-driven people. I think, really, at heart, pretty much all religious traditions have that orientation. Our task is to integrate these teaching into our daily lives.

I gotta say…. I get tired of hearing about how this is a “Christian Nation”.  Aside from the fact that that phrase alone negates the lived experience of all the non-Christians, in the context of the Ten Commandments, the idea is even harder to defend.  I’ll explain:

I AM THE LORD THY GOD…

THOU SHALT HAVE NO OTHER GODS BEFORE ME

These two have been used these two to justify wars and oppression the world over. I can only assume that these are the two that have been the rallying cry and justification for all Christian-based imperialism and colonization and all the evangelization that has resulted in ethnocides and genocides and loss of cultural diversity. Yes, other religions do this too – tribes, circling their wagons and distorting ideology in arrogance of their righteousness. This is not the way to welcome the stranger or love your neighbor.

If God is truly Omnipresent, which, by definition, means pervasive and ubiquitous, everywhere, then He is in the face and heart of all people regardless of race or creed. The question then, is whether we are willing to act from a place of recognition of this.

Of course, many people have forgotten this commandment entirely. Power and Economics are the gods now, they are the blunt instruments of so many decisions and policies.

THOU SHALT NOT MAKE UNTO THEE ANY GRAVEN IMAGE

What’s with the cross jewelry that has the chain attached at the top and bottom? Do the wearers not realize that ½ the time their cross is upside down? How is painting Jesus as a tall white person not a false image? He was middle eastern!

THOU SHALT NOT TAKE THE NAME OF THE LORD IN VAIN

If Jesus is the champion of the dispossessed, how is it not using him in a profane way to wave a “Christian flag” as part of an effort to oppress/repress people who are deemed as other? How is that living by His example? 

How is using the Bible and scriptural rhetoric not taking the Lord’s name in vain when it is used in an obviously bald-faced way to generate political support and pander to one’s followers, but not backed up by actual deeds or policy? Kudos to the Church leaders who call out this kind of hypocrisy and abuse. 

REMEMBER THE SABBATH AND KEEP IT HOLY

If you consider the Sabbath not to be an actual day of the week, but an orientation of life, in society on the whole, we see a drive toward the materialistic and the busy, not toward the contemplative. In our success-drive culture, the one where productivity is king, where is the room for contemplation? Quiet reflective time, where creativity, integration, healing and communion happen, is undervalued in this culture.

HONOR THY MOTHER AND FATHER

We are, all of us, brought up with certain beliefs and values. We are programmed based on the experiences, biases, and education of those who have raised us (actual parents, in my case) as well as the society and culture in which we live (the elders, the so-called experts, and the entertainers indoctrinate us in some way too). Yet not all of these lessons are carved in stone as absolute truths. We can and should do our own research, and if we learn something different, it’s OK to change one’s own internal compass. When we learn better, we can decide to do better.

My worldview has grown and changed based on my own experiences, reading, practice, reflection, and healing. I am striving toward a holistic worldview that honors all people and Mother Earth, who so desperately needs our love and care (see below). Yes, I probably ‘fail’ daily, yet the work continues.

THOU SHALT NOT KILL

Ummm. Yeah. Humans (of all stripes) have blown it BIG TIME on this one.

War. Gangs. Domestic violence. Police Brutality. Police Militarization. Death Penalty. Ethnocide and Genocide of the Natives. (need I go on?) Billions of dollars proposed to expand the military – paid for by cuts to domestic ‘discretionary’ spending: Killing over Caring does not create a sustainably peaceful society.

There is so much disaffection, alienation, hopelessness and frustration – so much of it caused by power plays and inability to love and connect to others. (love thy neighbor). By extension, shall we talk about the myriad ways we’re killing the environment? we’ll get to that later…

THOU SHALT NOT COMMIT ADULTERY

As is revealed often, Adultery is a common thing, but let’s take this a step further: Let’s talk about rape culture:

Let’s talk about the repression of women as objects of men’s entertainment. No one complains when a SuperBowl ad shows lots of T&A – but god forbid a Celebrity Entertainer does it on her own terms, then there’s all kinds of shaming happening – but that’s backward. This is the truth: when the ads do it, they are objectifying women to sell beer and cars; when the woman chooses it, she’s expressing her power – it’s not the same thing at all. 

That women are disposable when they no longer please or satisfy some man is disgusting. The Me Too movement has brought so much of this to light. That our sex is too often our primary currency ~> we are prostituted in many many ways in order to make our way in the world:  by ourselves (we have to work harder and longer for the accolades a man walks into); by our so-called superiors (how many times have I had to work my wiles, with clothes on, of course – but some women find themselves sleeping their way to the top); as well as the pimps, and the media, and, and, and… 

Let’s talk about the fact that women still don’t make the same pay or get as many promotions as men. That women didn’t get to vote until 100 years ago (Why would women volunteer to give that up during the 2016 election? crazy!) That for centuries, we had no right to property or money of our own, that we were used as bargaining chips, pawns, to solidify treaties and business deals among men. Let’s talk about the fact that it was only in the 1990’s that finally it became illegal to beat your wife, but that domestic abuse continues to this day. Let’s talk about the many times the women in your own family  have been harassed, followed, catcalled, trapped, and been forced upon – then the voice inside us telling us it’s not OK to stand up for ourselves, and the other voice that blames us, not the perpetrator. That incest, child prostitution, date rape and rape on campus is woefully under-reported – why?? Because as females we’ve been trained to be subservient and because we are all too often not taken seriously, and (most appalling) because it’s been normalized.

Let’s talk about the fact that women’s agency over their own bodies continues to be turned into one of the most contentious political issues of our time – that men think they should have a say is just more evidence that they think that women are not enough in and of themselves, that we should not be allowed to be in control of our own lives. Abortion is a hot-button issue, gets people all riled up… but it’s connected to everything in a woman’s life. I really don’t think you can talk about abortion without also considering how women and children are treated in society on the whole. Abortion is connected to so many other things: sex education, access to contraception, access to women’s health care (paps, mammo’s, etc…), adoption/foster care, accessibility to decent public education (for mother before, for the child later), help with pre- and post-natal care, access to health insurance, access to psychological care, access to drug rehab, access to jobs and maternity leave, access to affordable child-care, access to clean/healthy food that doesn’t cause birth defects or learning disabilities … in short, women need support. You can’t force a woman to keep a baby and then cut all the socially oriented programs that would give her the tools and support to raise it – otherwise the cycles of poverty and ignorance and overpopulation and mass incarceration will just continue. Becoming a mother is an act of great sacrifice, on the mental, physical and soul level – have you ever asked the women in your life what it is has cost them to become a mother? NO ONE has the right to make decisions for women they don’t even know.

Being a woman is often a hazard to our health and well-being.

THOU SHALT NOT STEAL

Remember when Jesus came into the temple and threw out all the money lenders? Yeah. We need him to do that again. Corporate bigwigs. Manifest destiny. Robber Barons. Eminent Domain. Contract labor. Predatory banking. Cutting taxes on the rich – Trickle down economics is a Lie. Companies polluting our environment and not cleaning it up = people’s health stolen. The ones in charge are doing everything in their power to maximize profits – this means shortchanging everyone ‘below’ them as much as possible = livelihoods stolen. Wall Street should not be considered the sole measure of the health of our society, because it is about projections of profitability of companies. It doesn’t take into consideration any other aspect of the society that most of us experience every day. We all know that politics and the economy are rigged by lobbyists to favor the wealthy and powerful. Do. Not. Be. Fooled. 

THOU SHALT NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS AGAINST THY NEIGHBOR

Fake News. Slander. Libel. “Witch Hunts”. Racism. Bigotry. Misogyny. Discrimination. The onslaught of tough-guy talk and mean tweets. Gleeful disdain of people who are “other” and the disrespecttful name-calling that goes with it. Hateful disregard and invalidation of people who are standing up for people who are some-way disadvantaged – isn’t social justice one of the major tenets of Christian faiths?

(The more common translation is) LOVE THY NEIGHBOR

If we truly love our neighbors, the way in which Christ teaches – to love the sinner and the beggar and the foreigner  – then, there is absolutely NO justification for gutting any of the following programs: food stamps and WIC and welfare and Medicare/Medicaid and Social Security and disability and public education (equity for all students!) Maybe the Federal Gov. is too big, too bureaucratic, too much in debt, but the states don’t have any money either – I am dubious that privatizing any of these programs will benefit anyone who needs them.

It says right there in the Declaration of Independence:        

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

A Love Thy Neighbor clause right there in founding documents! In this day and age, then, How is it morally justifiable not to extend the same rights to all people?

The Native Americans were here first. How have we shown them Love? Genocide, ethnocide, writing treaties and breaking them, bulldozing and polluting their sacred lands, selling their land out from under them – we have done the native people a great disservice – deep trauma is now part of their legacy. Our forefathers set them up for a great struggle to survive, denigrated their culture and shoved them onto some of the shittiest pieces of land, then blame the Natives for their failings. Earlier this year, the Secretary of the Interior ordered the Mashpee Wampanoag Reservation to be “disestablished.” Why???

And what about the legacy of slavery in this country? Another blight on our white patriarchal Christianity. The slaves were brought over here to do hard labor and were stripped of their dignity and all rights. Their families were broken up when members were sold off, and others were brutally abused or killed in front of them. Their owners justified all of this because slaves weren’t seen as actual people – and yet, they too were God’s children. The African-Americans, like the Indigenous peoples, have deep trauma in their lineage. They too have been set up… and then blamed for their failings. The history of this country is filled with instances of massacres of Black people – if you don’t know what I’m talking about, your education is woefully incomplete; Google something. (I know other immigrants were indentured, but being white, they were better able to blend in and move on – you can’t escape dark skin) Black Lives Matter.

Then there are the border and immigration issues… The border is not a solid thing, it is impossible to wall the US off from the world.  The effort, ultimately, will do more harm than good. It’s appropriate and reasonable to vet any asylum seekers, refugees, immigrants thoroughly. But in many ways, our immigration/migrant worker system is cruel and inhumane: from the ICE raids, to indefinite detention in cages, to poor working conditions for poverty wages.

The Mexico border wall is a pipe dream, a farce. Have you seen the articles about some of the border towns that will suffer economically and socially? The Tohono O’Odham tribe has a reservation on the AZ border with tribal lands and family members on both sides of the border. There is a town on the Mexican side that can only be reached from the US side. It’s a disaster for the environment and the wildlife, harming endangered species and ecosystems. If you look at David Taylor’s photos of each and every border marker (you can find him online), you will see that there are some that require climbing gear to get to. How can anyone really think a wall will work? Yes, there is crime that comes, but also there are good people who come too – There must be a better solution.

June is Pride Month and we must acknowledge the on-going fight for acceptance and the right to live that our neighbors in the LGBTQI+ community face on a daily basis. Love is Love is Love.

In order to Love Thy Neighbor, we need to look inside each other to find out how we can share the best of each other’s humanity. This is the work of the Love that Jesus preached, the inspiration for the non-violent protestors like Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. – to oppose injustice not out of hate, but from a place of deep love for our shared humanity. Mother Theresa is a shining example of Love for the downtrodden, the feared, the sick and the unlovable.

If God is Omnipresent, doesn’t that mean that he resides in everyone?

This is the meaning of the Sanskrit Namaste: 

that which is divine in me sees that which is divine in you.

We must have conversations about how to move forward together. This is how we become inclusive ‘both-and’ people instead of fearful, suspicious, all-or-nothing either-or people. ‘Both-and’ is an expansive win-win, it honors differences and begets true Unity.

THOU SHALT NOT COVET (NEIGHBOR’S WIFE)

How is this different from adultery? See above.

THOU SHALT NOT COVET (NEIGHBOR’S HOUSE)

THOU SHALT NOT COVET (NEIGHBOR’S PROPERTY)

Corporate takeovers, predatory banking, mega-mergers, tax breaks for the rich and the corporations, de-regulation of environmental protections which result in poisoning the surrounding communities. DAPL and others. The many displacements and broken treaties with the indigenous tribes. The toxic water in Flint, MI still has not been fixed. Corporate profits also have been prioritized over jobs for people. Lobbyists in Washington screw the constituents to line their pockets. Here in AZ, our education budget was gutted to pay for incentives to bring corporations here. 

– in this kind of system, the people always lose –

THE GARDEN OF EDEN

The Lord created the Garden specifically for Adam, the first man, whom God had formed. In Genesis 2:8-9, we read: “The LORD God planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there He put the man whom He had formed. And out of the ground the Lord God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. In the middle of the garden was where the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil…. The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to tend and keep it ” (Genesis 2:15).

God gave us this beautiful planet to inhabit and be custodians of – there are awe-inspiring landscapes, amazing wildlife and miraculous human bodies. 

Yet, we are destroying it all. We are killing wildlife right and left – Why? Progress? Greed? Carelessness? Trophies? We are despoiling our land and water in the name of corporate greed and the promise of jobs – the pollution will kill people/animals/ground/water alike, most often in low-income and rural areas. Earthquakes are becoming a thing where they’ve never happened before. Climate Change is a real thing, and not a good one. We are all at risk.

The current administration has removed our country from the Paris Agreement and has gutted over 80 environmental protections and regulatory laws.

We are bastardizing and nutritionally depleting our food sources with foreign DNA and massive amounts of toxic chemicals – we are depleting the soil and poisoning the farmers and ourselves. The crops are failing and the solution is to put more chemicals, more poison. The government is subsidizing the ongoing desecration and poisoning of our environment and gouging the budgets for education and public assistance. This is causing massive increases in illnesses and birth defects and developmentally challenged children. It’s a travesty.

We are treating Mother Earth with the same rape culture ideology that women have been subjected to for millennia – I believe this wholeheartedly. Extractive practices followed by the expectation that Mother Earth will just keep on giving without complaint.

Yes, the EPA is broken, but I fail to see how dismantling it will benefit anyone but the polluters driven to make a lot of money. How can we, in good conscience, leave a wasteland for our children? What’s that quote? It’s something like:

Only when there are no more trees or animals or clean water will man realize that he cannot live on money.

– – –     – – –     – – –

We have an idea in this country that we want our leaders to be unifiers, not dividers. We must keep our eyes open and our arms ready to embrace those who can teach us and lead us in a way that we can be united in our commonality as well as appreciative of our differences.

Many so-called Christians have made a big deal about hooking their wagon to the Conservative agenda in government. The funny thing is, the Conservative agenda is so bald-faced in raucously supporting legislation that, in reality, serves very few people who genuinely need the help, and that are in total opposition to the ideal of “Love Your Neighbor.”

We have to face truth – and these days, the truth ain’t pretty. This country’s priorities have become so, so skewed away from what’s good for people and community and the environment and toward militarization and pollution and greed. We can no longer hold onto beliefs that suppress or oppress or repress others so that we can remain comfortable in our old tribal belief systems, and in the privilege that affords us. Change is scary, I know. It takes a lot of courage to look at ourselves and see our blindspots and where we’ve fallen down. It also takes a lot of courage to begin the work of healing.

I’ve done a lot of healing work for myself. There have been many wounds I’ve had to heal for and within myself; all the battles with the difficult things from my own up-bringing, and the patterns of behavior and beliefs that I grew up with. I am exhausted from the fight to exist, to be able to use my voice, to recognize my own value. And yet, I realize my own privilege and that my work is not done! There is much left to do. There are so many who have had similar (often worse) struggles, who feel the same way, who are striving to heal themselves and each other and all of us. May we all support each other in working toward something better.

It seems to me that we need to quit wrangling over whether or not any religion is better than another or being persecuted more than another. That is completely beside the point – all Gods are just various faces of the One, who is much greater that any human mind can comprehend. 

What matters is how our actions reflect the teachings of Love: 

Are we striving for the good of all?

Or only for a few?

There are lots of people who are feeling forgotten, disenfranchised. We need to, each of us, look inside our hearts and minds and actually investigate our shadow self – the ugly, selfish bits that we normally try to pretend don’t exist. We need to figure out that this is our one planet – this is Eden! And that really, we are all genetically and energetically connected due to millennia of travel and trade and intermixing. There is only one human family.

“For one human being to love another;

that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks,

the ultimate, the last test and proof,

the work for which all other work is but preparation.”

~ Rainer Maria Rilke

We must come together in unity and LOVE each other. The fear and misogyny and hatred and divisiveness and hypocrisy in our culture these days is almost more than I can bear. Every day is a knife in my gut. I can no longer be silent about it.

With great Love, always