"Pale Blue Dot" (I)

[Carl] Sagan . . . persuaded NASA engineers to turn the Voyager I spacecraft around on Valentine’s Day in 1990, so that it could take a picture of Earth from the very edge of our solar system, about 4 billion miles away. In the photograph, Earth appears as a tiny bluish speck. Sagan later wrote of the photograph, “Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives . . . [on that] mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.” ~writersalmanac.publicradio.org 11/9/07 [quoted from Pale Blue Dot, p. 6, one of Sagan’s last books, 1994]

“Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home.” Namaste.

image: “pale blue dot” – image of Earth (arrow) taken by Voyager; others say at 3.7 billion miles away http://tinyurl.com/2lwbnx

Yet, a New Day!

Same old story:

new life
hope
peace

. . . Yet, a new day!

~Koshin (Bob Hanson), 12/15/02

Life does go on in its petty pace, but sometimes it is revealed to us that life is new moment, new day, new life. ~jpc

So what is the truth about life? Namaste.

image: "New Life" Sure Signs 2004 Kazuya Akimoto Art Blog0

Working without a Why

When we work from a deep and spiritual place we do so without an extrinsic purpose in mind. We work for the sake of working and love for the sake of loving and live for the sake of living. . . . Working without a why means letting go of all superficial enticements to our labor and working out of our innermost selves. ~Matthew Fox, The Reinvention of Work, pp. 79-80, via Randy Williams

Work is universal. Like squirrels and ants, we work for the sake of working, first of all. Then we can talk about putting food on the table. ~jpc

Work is holy. Namaste.

image en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikijunior:World_at_work

Who We Really Are

Nothing can be itself without being in communion with everything else, nor can anything truly be the other without first acquiring a capacity for interior presence to itself. ~Thomas Berry, “Contemplation and World Order,” in Riverdale Papers, V, p. 2

Who are we? We are in communion with everything else, we are other, we are presence. ~jpc

O to be more fully who we are. Namaste.

image: “standing tall,” hkvam http://tinyurl.com/2d9962

"Transisting"

Once the external time demands of employment are gone, time changes, natural rhythms are revealed. Mine seem very slow. Once I stopped feeling guilty for not being “productive,” I realized that with the stressful pace of my work during the last four years I had lost the importance of living mindfully, in the moment. ~Sandra True, from EarthRise reflection, 11/5/07

Though “transist” is not a word in most dictionaries, it is a state we all have been in and find rather wondrous and mysterious, sometimes making us new. ~jpc

Go ahead and be, intentionally. Namaste.

image: Fall in the North Carolina mountains www.news-record.com 11/7/07

Sunday Dialogue LXXX

Journer: What’s it going to take to bring us together?

Nez: My student* said, “Beware of the differences that blind us to the unity that binds us.”

Journer: What is the unity between jihadists and capitalists?

Nez: Breath.

______
* Huston Smith, The Way Things Are, p. 36

image: Richard Howie photo . . . frost on the bathroom window, with the trees in the woods barely visible

Asking Me to Believe . . .

Barbara and I were sitting in a pew at our local Catholic Church listening to the priest’s sermon. While he was talking, it dawned on me what the Church was asking of my belief system. It wanted me to believe in a male, white, Hebrew tribal god. Even though the Hebrews refused to say the name of this god, the Church not only named it but gave it a sex. ~Bill Alerding, from EarthRise reflection, 11/5/07

Is it any wonder that our “God” is too small, encumbered with all our trappings? I don't have anything against most human personal characteristics, but the eternal power that is mysterious and not human can hardly be described thus. ~jpc

What about “O Thou,” or “O-YAH,” or utter silence? Namaste.

image: "Mountain Clouds," by Marooned http://tinyurl.com/29bqdc

Real Happiness

As Bobby Kennedy said . . . the nation’s gross national product measures everything “except that which makes life worthwhile.” . . . [H]appiness seems to have little relation to economic achievement, which we have historically understood as the driver of well-being. . . . A . . . recent study found that life satisfaction in China declined between 1994 and 2007, a period in which average real incomes grew by 250 percent. ~Eduardo Porter, “All They Are Saying Is Give Happiness a Chance,” nytimes.com, 11/12/07

What really makes us happy? ~jpc

Happy are the _______________. Namaste.

image: "Hot Car Sales in China . . ." www.chinadaily.com.cn/.../02/content_396733.htm

Science of Gratitude

[D]opamine is released when people are feeling good or are excited by a challenge . . . eudaimonia [is] the happiness or fulfillment that comes from the action itself, not the result of it. Any other benefits that come along – someone is grateful, your project is a success – are icing on the cake. ~Deborah Norville, from Thank You Power: Making the Science of Gratitude Work for You (Reader’s Digest, pp. 150-51, Oct. 2007), via LLC

The universe, the way it is, is conspiring to make us feel good, excited, happier, and more fulfilled – among other things. ~jpc

And we give thanks for that. Namaste.

image: “Day 311 / 365,” vvt’s photos http://www.flickr.com/photos/vvt/

"Related"*

I am forced
to relate
to being
related.

Consciously
I now know
we are just
related.

In our love
or our hate
we are now
related.

And in this
relation
is what we
are given.

Plus I must
freely choose
to be or
not to be . . .

who I am:
related
to you as
we now are.

From now on
we cannot
unrelate
to each other.

Spirit’s now
at times like
these when we
know we are . . .

related
as a mate . . .
a species . . .
a planet.

~jpc, 11/7/07

Namaste.

* note: reflection on Kierkegaard’s “by relating itself to its own self and by willing to be itself the self is grounded transparently in the Power which posited it” (Fear and Trembling and Sickness Unto Death, trans. Walter Lowrie, p. 147)

image http://joana-simoes-aneis.blogspot.com/2007/09/a152-anel-de-prata.html

Good Provokes

“Good provokes and forces us to think about things we’d rather not think about,” Kidder stated, noting that we tend to push away virtuousness that exceeds our own. . . . Kidder waited six years from the time he met [Paul] Farmer before beginning work on the book. “If I started following this guy around, [I knew] he was going to disturb my peace of mind. And he did.” The time with Farmer, however, was the most exhilarating of his life. ~interview with Tracy Kidder, author of Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, A Man Who Would Cure the World, 10/10/07 http://candler.emory.edu/NEWS/102407.cfm

Future heroes are provoked by good now. Namaste.

image: children in Rwanda making the PIH (Partners In Health) sign http://www.pih.org/home.html

Saving Lives

Tense with the threat of discovery at a time and place when giving a Jew water was punishable by death, the zoo under the Zabinskis nonetheless remained a place alive. . . . Antonina herself, a woman who served sit-down meals [to the Jews under their care], analyzed in her diaries the emotional needs of her guests, and refused to lose her sense of connection to the world. In spite of the carnage around them, the Zabinskis saved the lives of approximately three hundred Polish Jews. ~Suzanne Antonetta’s review of Diane Ackerman’s, The Zookeeper’s Wife http://tinyurl.com/2hojvs via Karen Bueno

There is always a way to save life. Namaste.

image: Monument to the Warsaw Uprising . . . they tried to fight back against the Nazis but ended up getting slaughtered goroadtrip.com/blog/europe/warsaw/

Sunday Dialogue LXXIX

Journer: What’s wrong with just having fun?

Nez: My student* said superficial living “ignores the tragic and denies the transcendent.”

Journer: Is living profoundly having fun?

Nez: Fulfillment is at the heart of fun, tragedy, transcendence – making living profound.

______
* Gabriel Marcel http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/marcel

image: on the way to Bubun village consult, North Sumatra, Indonesia, 1979 (L-R consultants: Marge Tomlinson, jpc, Joel Wright, Rob Jennings-Teats)

Huge Benefit

[We humans are] a huge benefit to the world. We tend to think of ourselves as some sort of plague, or destructive agency. Although we are, at the same time we are something wonderful. . . . Through our eyes, the Earth has seen for the very first time, from space, what an incredibly beautiful planet she is. ~James Lovelock, http://tinyurl.com/2xrbc5 interview, 2/07, via Jane Zammit

Don’t tear us humans down. At the same time, don’t think we are the earth’s greatest gift. ~jpc

All have a profound role to play. Namaste.

image: L-R: Armstrong, Collins, and Aldrin, astronauts of Apollo 11 and first humans to land on the Moon

What Matters

[Authentic] learning organizations are not about trying to be happy and work more efficiently, but about building the earth. . . . To maintain our sanity and to be effective, we all must focus, but the focus is . . . more meaningful when it flows from something much deeper. ~George Walters, Springboard e-mail, 9/30/07

Learning organizations, as Peter Senge writes, are crucial to what matters to the team. Walters is saying what matters to every team, in the long run, is building the earth. ~jpc

Let the big picture and depth understanding guide our work. Namaste.

image: ICA MENA (Middle East North Africa) training meeting http://icai.smugmug.com/gallery/2335804#114968598

"Dancing on the Water"

Fiddler A.C. Bushnell two years ago received the diagnosis of liver cancer. He made a list of what he’d do if he lived one year or thirty. He said in an interview, “Life is a terminal condition for all of us. . . . Death has made the world brighter and more beautiful to me.” One thing on his list was doing a solo album. “Dancing on the Water,” just out, is the result. Through his experience, A.C. is “finding the faith to make music his way.” Oh, and a bonus: he’s cancer free. ~adapted from NPR station interview , 11/01/07, via LLC listen http://wunc.org/tsot/archive/sot1101c07.mp3/view

Transforming experiences come in spirited ways. Namaste.

image and another article and listen to “Dancing on the Water” (about the sea of tranquility) http://tinyurl.com/379fv8

"Freedom Writers"

Teacher Erin Gruwell (Hillary Swank) talking to student Andre: I know what you’re up against. We’re all of us up against something. So you better make up your mind, because until you have the balls to look me straight in the eye and tell me . . . , I am not letting you fail. Even if that means coming to your house every night until you finish the work. I see who you are. Do you understand me . . . you are not failing. ~“Freedom Writers” (2007 movie: clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vQreg-VjYQ with the real Erin, also)

Erin finds her calling as she helps transform an at-risk, extremely diverse urban high school class. In the true story they raise money and travel to Auschwitz and Anne Frank’s family hideout . . . oh, yes, and write a book. Imaginal education par excellence. ~jpc

Erin's father tells her, “You have been blessed with a burden.” Namaste.

image www.reelingreviews.com/freedomwriters.htm

Francis' Family Green

For Francis . . . sun isn’t something we hope will come out so we can enjoy the ballgame; the sun is my brother. The moon isn’t something to ignore most nights . . . , the moon is my sister, precious, fair. . . . We are siblings, the sun, moon, trees, animals – and God is our Father. ~James C. Howell, Myers Park United Methodist, Charlotte, NC, via LLC

Profound metaphors: all of us of creation are siblings with a common parenting spirit. We are to enjoy each other forever. ~jpc

Family green is foreseen. Namaste.

image: "The Sun, the Moon and the Stars" searchwarp.com/swa7059.htm

Forever Graced

[I believe] that this existence is the place of meaning and that meaning is not a supernatural reality but an extraordinarily mundane reality, transparently present in every moment to the eye of the beholder. I want people to understand that the life within is utterly crucial. . . . I want people to understand that existence is graced, and therefore precious, and that their living life in self-conscious thanksgiving and universal dedication is its meaning. ~jpc, Called To Be, p. 295

Forever graced. Namaste.

image: “Phil” by infxualbydesign http://www.flickr.com/photos/infxualbydesign/1886121773/

Sunday Dialogue LXXVIII

Journer: I hear the word “cosmology” a lot lately. What’s that all about?

Nez: My student* said, “We are in the cosmos and the cosmos is in us.”

Journer: What difference does that make to my everyday living?

Nez: All the difference if you care about the roots, meaning, and future of life.

______
* Matthew Fox, Original Blessing, p. 69

image: by pfong "Into the West" http://www.flickr.com/photos/pfong/1601700526/

Altruism through Technology

“In Redmond, you don’t see 7-year-olds begging on the street,” said Sean Blagsvedt, Babajob’s founder [www.Babajob.com seeks to bring the social-networking revolution to people who do not even have computers – the world’s poor], referring to Microsoft’s headquarters in Washington State, where he once worked. “In India, you can’t escape the feeling that you’re really lucky. So you ask, What are you going to do about all the stuff around you? How are you going to use all these skills?” ~Anand Giridharadas, “In India, Poverty Inspires Technology Workers to Altruism,” nytimes.com, 10/30/07

Caring for the world through your work is vocational “eptitude.” Namaste.

image: http://babajob.com/ to read more (scroll down for video interview with Sean B.)

Universal Creativity

[C]reativity consists in activating, expressing, and fulfilling the universe process, the earth process, the life process, and the human process within the possibilities of our historical moment. ~Thomas Berry,* “Perspectives on Creativity: Openness to a Free Future,” via M. Fox, Original Blessing, p. 178

This is the context for creative and ethical living (at whatever age). ~jpc

And spirit reigns in each process. Namaste.

* Happy 93rd Birthday, Thomas!

image: grandson Preston in the historical moment of water play

Forcing Me to Relate

. . . Yes, yellow tulip, in your place of honor
you are revolutionary,
transforming reality.
Forcing me to relate to my relationship to you,
you invite interpretation,
consciousness and
eventually a whole story of creation! . . .

~Rod Rippel, The Yellow Tulip & Other Poems, p. 6

The whole story of creation is in every finite part of it. Namaste.

image: photo by Daniele Restelli, http://tinyurl.com/yvg898

Prayer Is Energy

[Prayer is] energy, the spiritual equivalent of a big cuppa coffee – the energy of renewed awareness of relationships, the needs and heart desires of both myself and others, communion with a magnificent Mystery, and gratitude for all that was, is and shall be. ~Sandra Conant Strachan, from EarthRise refleciton, 10/18/07

That’s one heck of an experience of prayer. Must be real. ~jpc

O to keep the energy flowing. Namaste.

image: "Morning Prayer After a Day of Rest" by Ellen Howie, 10/9/07

Earth Will Take Care of Us

At Oxford, [Lovelock] once stood up and admonished Mother Teresa for urging an audience to take care of the poor and “leave God to take care of the Earth.” As Lovelock explained to her, “If we as people do not respect and take care of the Earth, we can be sure that the Earth, in the role of Gaia, will take care of us and, if necessary, eliminate us.” ~Jeff Goodell, “The Prophet of Climate Change: James Lovelock,” rollingstone.com, 10/17/07, via Bill Salmon

I heard someone say, “We don’t have to worry about global warming . . . the Rapture will take care of that.” ~jpc

Our global priorities and our theology need much work. Namaste.

image: Oct. 18th issue of Rolling Stone (notice headline over Bruce's left shoulder)

All Are Marvels

When will we teach our children in school what they are? We should say to each of them: Do you know what you are? You are a marvel. . . . Yes, you are a marvel. And when you grow up, can you then harm another who is, like you, a marvel? ~Pablo Casals, Joys and Sorrows, p. 295

Is this not the truth when you consider the universal process that brings us all into being? ~jpc

Peace begins at an early age. Namaste.

image: Julienne Medi holds her newborn baby, Ngongo Diella (Boston Globe/Dominic Chavez) www.boston.com/news/world/gallery/congo?pg=9

Sunday Dialogue LXXVII

Journer: Do you believe in universal salvation?

Nez: My student* said, “If being is by nature holy there is no salvation except of everything that exists.”

Journer: But what if Judaism, Christianity, and Islam do not agree?

Nez: Then they need to contemplate and meditate more on the power at the heart of the universe.

______
* Teilhard de Chardin, Human Energy, p. 139

image: "Visions from Other Spaces," Giampaolo Macorig http://www.flickr.com/photos/gmacorig/1675752724/

Same God-force

I’m not into isms and asms. There isn’t a Catholic moon and a Baptist sun. I know the universal God is universal. . . . I feel that the same God-force that is the mother and father of the pope is also the mother and father of the loneliest wino on the planet. ~Dick Gregory, via Matthew Fox, Original Blessing, p. 67

Who would have thought that Dick has a more profound theology than many religious leaders? ~jpc

Everything, including popes and winos, is of universal value. Namaste.

Pioneers Vision

I saw the Omnipotent’s flaming pioneers
. . .
The labourers in the quarries of the gods,
The messengers of the Incommunicable,
. . .
Lips chanting an unknown anthem of the soul,
. . .
Their tread one day shall change the suffering earth
And justify the light on Nature’s face.

~Sri Aurobindo, Savitri: A Legend and a Symbol, “III: The Book of the Divine Mother,” via Becky Watson

O to fulfill the vision. Namaste.

image: Fluens observes the Noosphere farcartouche.blogspot.com/2006_10_01_archive.html

Enough Profundity

I never experience the reality of God without the reality of the world, nor the reality of the world without the reality of God. ~Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Ethics, p. 40, DWB ed.

Wed this with Doorn’s quote yesterday, “Our consciousness depends on this world, as our world depends on our consciousness,” and we have enough profundity to live on: reality, consciousness and experience of it, and saying “yes” to being driven this way and that by reality. ~jpc

Quite enough profundity, indeed. Namaste.

image: pre-lunar eclipse, eclipse, by lobster rocket http://tinyurl.com/yqn8ey