As a woman and a mother I know of hidden cruelty. But to see it publicly endorsed? Action is needed, and so too is emotional and spiritual grief support for those of us too familiar with this reality.
It’s a hard thing to be still, to breathe, or to even want to join in spirit, yet it is also the most elegant and supportive way through hard times.
This Hidden Monastery invites you to bring body and soul into community and to share wisdom and solidaity for the time we are in. Movement and voice are often the most effective forms for doing this.
- Nancy Pfatzgraf is leading the online dance chapel tomorrow 9:30am- 10:30 am PST. If you are familar with zoom Just click on https://zoom.us/j/258680712
- Friday I will be leading at InterPlayce at 10:30-12 for respite and self care.
- Saturday morning 10-12:30 I will lead a session at InterPlayce to share body wisdom for our times. This is part of a larger Hidden Monastery Retreat.
- Thursday June 28th I will teach an online session for Gifted and Sensitive Bodies.You are welcome to consider any of these offerings.
Meanwhile, Rabbi Arthur Waskow, Shalom Center, offered a list of actions today- and wrote about The Lightning Flash that Reveals our Hidden Cruelties and Lights our Way to Compassionate Action–In it he says, ”
Isaiah (10:2) cries out, “Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees, to deprive the poor of their rights and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people, making widows their prey and robbing the fatherless.”
Out of exactly that Prophetic outlook, Jesus broke the law, nonviolently. That’s why he was crucified. Does the fact that the Roman Empire crucified Jesus mean that it is legitimate for the United States Government to destroy the lives of children and parents? Or does it mean exactly the opposite?
There is a reason that one of the key moments in the story of Pharaoh is when he orders babies killed (Exodus 1: 15-22 ). And in the Christian story, one of the key moments is when Herod orders children killed in the “Massacre of the Innocents.” (Matthew 2: 16; imagined below). Those are the moments when a tyrant becomes monstrous.
Outrage at these actions comes from a very deep gut level. The “prime directive” for every species, including the human species, is to make sure the next generation thrives. The children! You can only rip children away from their families by dehumanizing the people you are facing. Down that path lies genocide.
The cruelty we are witnessing is being blatantly exposed as intrinsic to racism and militarism. All societies face the dangerous impulse to exalt only their own culture as fully human and treat others as sub-human. Indeed, for centuries, American policy has ripped the children of enslaved Africans, African-Americans, and Native Americans away from their families.
But the vision and hope of the Bible, the Quran, and other sacred wisdom is summed up in the Bible’s teaching, “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18 and Matthew 22:39) and the Quran’s teaching (49:13): “O humankind, We have created you from a single pair of male and female [as one family], and appointed you diverse cultures and communities, that you may get to profoundly understand one another [not to despise one another].”