Civil Religion

Guns are for killing people. Guns are necessary against foes. Guns are due to distrust and fear. Distrust and fear are from the self as well as the other, essentially from small selves: self-centeredness. Self-centeredness is the fundamental obstacle against unity.

Anyone who aspires to unity and peace must become selfless. Selflessness has no distrust and fear: great people have no foes. Friends need no guns. Friendship ensures unity. Friendship (from friendly love: philia-domos; beloved domain: priya-dhaman) knows no bounds, but limitless liberation, light, love, and life.

Actually selfishness, distrust and fear, foes and guns are intertwined, enforcing and expanding (self-sense, psychic-syndrome, social system, sales-symbiosis, etc.). They are in egg-chick relations. The solution is in the link, each one’s holistic vision and action wholly linking. “Man started it; man can stop it.”

The same applies to the relationship between peace and weapons. Anyone who aspires to and announces peace must…

I hope this isn’t bad form, but my time writing for Civil Religion is coming to an end and I want to thank all of you who have read and commented on my posts over the last year and a half. You have helped me to grow in so many ways, and I’ve appreciated the unique voices and perspectives that you have brought to this site. I do have a personal blog and if you want to visit me there, I would love to hear from you. The address is: onlyslightlyunhinged.wordpress.com

Thank you again, and I wish each of you the very best in the future.

Will we? (Photo credit: Jim Wilson/The New York Times)

A stunningly violent shooting in Tucson, Arizona, and we are talking again about violence and violent images. And the war of words has begun.

I have to confess that I am frequently bewildered by the violent use of violent metaphors in our public speaking. And I don’t just mean politics. Our culture is saturated with it—countless “battles” with one person, team, party, or thing; innumerable “wars,” cultural and otherwise. It makes me warily weary (or wearily wary?) just thinking about it. It reminds me of growing up as a boy with toy soldiers and toy guns, playing games with the neighborhood kids. Which means I often find it childish, or, at best, adolescent.

And please, don’t get me wrong: I am not saying that the image of gunsights on a United States map are the cause…

The last century was called “the century of nationalism and wars” amongst nations, with “crimes against humanity” committed against humans, leading to the “first mass murder of human beings.”

This century seems set to become “the century of nationalism and wars” against the global life system, with crimes committed against all living beings, leading to the “sixth mass extinction” of life on our planet.

Nations claim sovereignty like kings claim absolute power over people. Both nations and kings behave as if they have prerogatives to kill, steal, lie, and discriminate (as in wars, colonialism, racism, etc.).

Other major modern institutions — corporations, media, educational institutions, and even religions — follow suit, in the manner of nations, acting in similar ways, appealing to and mobilizing “self” survival instincts.

They must know that there is no sovereignty in any system, and must work with “system” survival inspiration. These institutions are now ruled…

Years ago I was at a conference, and during one session our leader asked us to break into small groups and discuss certain passages from the New Testament about discipleship.  These included a passage in which Jesus counsels people to give up all their possessions, and another in which he insists that “If any one comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.  Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me, cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14: 26-27).

Immediately the other people in my group began a vigorous attack on the passages at hand.  They began to dismantle the verses, musing  out loud about what the words might mean at a metaphorical level, or what kind of cultural context might have led to such…

Christina Greene was a 9/11 baby.

I believe that each of our souls chooses when and where to incarnate. What bright, brave souls chose to be 9/11 babies in America. And Christina was one of them.

Her mother told The New York Times that Christina was proud of her birthdate, and aware that her birth and the birth of others on that day represented hope.

Greg Segalini holds a photo of his niece Christina Green and his sister, Roxanna Green, in Tucson. Photo by Mark Henle/The Arizona Republic, via Associated Press.

“From the very beginning, she was an amazing child,” her mother Roxanna Greene said. “She was very bright, very mature, off the charts. She was the brightest thing that happened that day.”

Christina was a member of her elementary school’s student council. She was interested in government, so a family friend offered to…

Once again a shooting spree has shocked here and all over the world! Why does it happen again and again here, while democracy and freedom are said to be exported all over the world?

There is a grave misunderstanding about democracy and freedom here the most, but all over the world also. Democracy is not mobocracy. Freedom is not licentiousness.

Freedom is familiarity and friendship as shown from its cognate (Sanskrit priya-dhaman, beloved domain) and its root (Latin philia-domos, friendly domain).

Freedom is possible only by complete understanding and compassionate action as family members in love and friends in need.

Democracy is equality and peace as shown from its etymology (Latin demos-cratus, people’s power) and its history (equal and peaceful system against pyramidal rule).

Democracy is possible only by complete equality and active peace, by system members without discrimination and friends without violence.

No one can claim freedom and democracy…

As it happens, when Classic 99 went off the air in July 2010, it never died. Classic99.com continues to live stream its vast catalog of classical and sacred music online, just as it did when it broadcast on the FM dial. Matter of fact, I’m listening to it as I write this post, and I’m even hearing the familiar voices of former KFUO-FM announcers, now volunteers for the Internet station.

And The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod has announced that the Synod’s Board of Directors voted to provide an additional $193,000 through at least mid-2012 “not only to continue but to improve the way it provides quality classical and sacred music to listeners via the Internet.” And, evidently, both the online station and its listener base are expanding.

[By the way, the signature dances to The Nutcracker are now playing, perhaps a final ode to the Christmas season on this…

This holiday season I’ve had the bittersweet experience of standing room only, balcony full crowds in our sanctuary.  While this sounds like what every pastor wants, the circumstances make all the difference.  And this was not what I wanted.

The first time was Wednesday, December 22nd for the funeral of 19 year old Tyrice Spencer, shot outside a basketball game at Clyde C. Miller.  Spencer was a member of Resurrection Temple, led by my friend Rev. Kevin Anthony.  The second was Thursday, December 30th for the PASS THE MIC Youth Town Hall on Violence convened by a growing coalition of Christian and Muslim leaders, community activists, attorneys and youth.  This was unfortunately the same day 17 year old Ranisha Cole was eulogized and Orlando Willis, a 16 year old student, died from the Christmas Day shootings at The Pulse.  While the…

Holocaust survivor Sara Wolf, left, lights a candle with her son, Michael, and granddaughters, Lauren, 13, left, and Jordyn, 15, right. during the Yom HaShoah commemoration at Shaare Zedek Synagogue. By Sarah Conard.

Two conservative synagogues have ended merger discussions, according to the Jewish Light.

The failure of Brith Sholom Kneseth Israel’s and Shaare Zedek Synagogue’s boards to achieve two-thirds majority votes Monday nights comes in the wake of a similar failed effort at merging two reform synagogues last month.

“There were a lot of good questions asked by both boards,” said Rick Kodner, president of Brith Sholom Kneseth Israel in Richmond Heights, told the Light. “I’ve just got to believe that we didn’t make the case.”

Kodner’s brother, Gary, president of  Shaare Zedek in University City, told the newspaper that the boards knew a “no” vote meant a likely end to the…

Snow covers everything, making the world purified and still, keeping people inside, making animals hibernate, and thus bringing them closer to truth (cognate of tree: stable and sustaining) and peace (cognate of pact: agreeable and agreed) . Sitting and stilling karma lets us settle in truth, peace, holiness, and beauty.

Sitting and stilling can bring anyone truth, peace, holiness, and beauty, transcending small selves, strife, separation, and suffering. We find the original order is in nature’s nature. When we witness truth, peace, holiness, and beauty, we know all others can attain them, and naturally we want to share them with others, with wisdom and compassion.

Dogen and others said they do not leave the forest (furi-sorin: not leaving forest), meaning they remain in truth, peace, holiness and beauty, beyond worldly delusion, doubts, discrimination, and dust. Dogen’s forest life, awakened life, is expressed in his poem titled “original face”:

Flowers…

At the longest night of the winter solstice, we saw the morning star in the east and the full moon in the west. This morning, we could not see the bright moon, prevented by clouds, expecting snow. We could, however, see illuminations in and on houses celebrating the coming spring. The sun will bring ever increasing daylight day by day.

We cannot see stars, the moon, or the sun when clouds prevent them from shining through. People cannot see illuminations when walls and wars prevent them from shining forth. Dark clouds, thick walls, and bloody wars prevent us from seeing bright light illuminating the world. Will mankind see the brilliant, beautiful future?

The Awakened One said, “I see no single thing so uncultivated and unfit for cultivation as is the mind,” and also “I see no single thing so cultivated and fit for cultivation as is the mind.” With cultivation…

According to NASA’s Dr. Tony Phillips, the last full lunar eclipse on a Winter Solstice happened in 1378.

Humanity has had better years. Ecclesiastical historians might remember 1378 as the year of the Papal Schism, which began a series of Pope/Anti-Pope face-offs in the Roman Catholic Church. In England, rumblings of another type of schism can be seen in John Wycliffe’s calls for reform in the Catholic church and the translation of the Bible into the common tongue.

The Hundred Year’s War continued. The worst years of the Black Death were over in Europe, but a recurrence would strike England in just a few months and rage for

An illumination depicting Giovanni Boccaccio and Florentines who have fled the plague.

another four years. Italian wool merchants had briefly taken over the government of Florence, winning a government representing all social…

"Zeitoun" by Dave Eggers. Cover art depicting Zeitoun assisting his neighbors.

“Zeitoun” is the true story of an American Muslim’s heroic efforts during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina to come to the rescue of his community and city.  Unfortunately for the main character in the book, his Arab and Muslim heritage results in him having to endure a tragic set of circumstances on top of the catastrophe that residents of New Orleans were already living through.

This award winning book reminds us that members of many faiths, including Islam, call America home.  American Muslims, just like their fellow citizens, are engaged everyday in trying to make their communities a better place.

The book details the breakdown of the fabric of society in New Orleans after Katrina.  As we all know,…

The winter solstice is the day when the sun, standing at the northern limit, shifts from ever increasing nighttime to ever increasing daytime. Thus, it has a universal, especially religious, significance as the turning point from darkness to brightness, from death to life – and so is associated with festivals of light, tree festivals, etc.

The Buddha was enlightened or awakened from the long night of human nescience in this season, seeing the morning star shining forth in the darkness, indicating the newly born sun illuminating the world in brilliance. It was the salient systemic solution of the life-death problems of all living beings.

All suffering of living beings comes from self-centeredness, developed and evolved from self-survival instinct and interest: ego-infatuation, -indulgence, and -indignation; “self” delusion, desire, and divisiveness; the three poisons. We struggle in the dark cloud of karma, creating hurricanes and snow storms.

Humans, with advanced brains and…