Tikkun Daily Blog Archive (https://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/author/davidsylvester/)
Activist and Tikkun contributor David A. Sylvester, recently returned from Honduras, is asking you to “help tip the balance toward peace and away from violence and repression.” Read the full article to find out how you can help!
How can we get the Christian way of life back on track? What must we do to stop these cheap and easy Hallmark Card versions of Easter? The answer, in my opinion, is that we must embrace the experience of Holy Saturday.
If you are following the news, you might know that sometime this week, Fr. Roy Bourgeois is going to be expelled from the Maryknoll order after more than 40 years as one of its leading members. Later, the Vatican is undoubtedly going to defrock – the word is “laicize” — him as a Catholic priest. This rupture comes two years after Fr. Roy participated in an unapproved ordination of a Catholic woman as a priest.
Many years ago, when I was struggling to understand the smoke-and-mirrors world of corporate journalism, a Washington, D.C., veteran passed on to me a bit of wisdom:
When I was a reporter, an old PR pro once told me something. He said ‘You come to the press conferences and you listen, and the first mistake you make is that you think we’re lying. You discover we’re not lying. Then you make a greater mistake. You think we’re telling the truth.’
If you have followed the latest news, you might think that the Catholic Church has just made changes to “equate” the the sexual abuse of children with ordaining women as priests. That’s what the New York Times told us over a week ago:
VATICAN CITY – The Vatican issued revisions to its internal laws on Thursday making it easier to discipline sex-abuser priests, but caused confusion by also stating that ordaining women as priests was as grave an offense as pedophilia. The decision to link the issues appears to reflect the determination of embattled Vatican leaders to resist any suggestion that pedophilia within the priesthood can be addressed by ending the celibacy requirement or by allowing women to become priests. Naturally, if you take this report at face value, as I did and many others have, including some on Tikkun Daily, you would think that the Church must be run by people who are either overtly evil or mentally ill. So I started looking into this episode.
Feeling lethargic or depressed? Take a look at this 20-minute video of Sam Daley-Harris talking about his work lobbying for social change and advocating for microcredit to help assist the poor. You will probably get a healthier jolt of inspiration and energy than from another espresso or Red Bull. [youtube: video=”t_LLCUQlB5E”]
It comes from his presentation in May at a TEDx New Jersey Libraries conference entitled “Poverty, Purpose, Pitfalls, and Redemption” which sums up more than 30 years of his thinking in citizen lobbying and microfinance for the poor. His own personal journey shows what hope and faith can do.
Three years ago, Sen. Barack Obama was sharp, forceful and eloquent in his questions to Gen. David Petraeus about the failure of the U.S. occupation of Iraq. In a congressional hearing on Iraq, Obama did not mince words with the general:
This continues to be a disastrous foreign policy mistake. And we are now confronted with the question: How do we clean up the mess and make the best out of a situation in which there are no good options, there are bad options and worse options? [youtube: video=”F9wtAqXq7Sg”]
Sen. Barack Obama questions Gen. Petraeus during Iraq hearings, 2007. (Go to 3:00 of this 9:45 minute video for above quote.)
This same candidate Obama was also confidently talking about withdrawing all U.S. troops from Iraq within 16 months during his 2007 interviews.
Dennis Hopper had an unfortunate gift for self-marginalization. He played the buffoon, the drunk, the druggie, the sex addict whose foolish behavior obscured a serious sensibility. When he died on May 29 at the age of 74 from prostate cancer, his life was once again in chaos. On his deathbed, he was divorcing his wife of 18 years, getting a restraining order to keep from seeing her. The mainstream writers, with their unfailing instinct for the superficial, remembered him as a “Hollywood bad boy,” a “rebel,” a “hellraiser.”
The irony of the Arizona law (pdf here) outlawing “immigrating-while-poor-and-brown” is that Arizona has 22 federally recognized native American tribes — people who suffered the onslaught of European colonists in successive waves. From the point of view of the First Nations United, Arizona’s law is based on power “established by an immigrant and illegal settler colonialist government, which has consistently relied on the genocide and mistreatment of the original peoples of this continent.” As the first peoples of this continent, we pose this question to Governor Brewer, Senator Russell Pearce, and law enforcement in the state of Arizona, “Who are you to check for documents?” Who indeed? If Arizonans start pointing a finger at the new arrivals, they have three fingers pointing back at themselves.
Undocumented migrants have a right to work here because they deserve economic reparations for failed U.S. economic policies and disastrous military interventions. We hardly need another symptom of the spiritual and social bankruptcy of the system, but this new Arizona law targeting and criminalizing undocumented migrants is a good example. You might know that Gov. Jan Brewer signed last week a new law that broadens police power to stop anyone at anytime for virtually any reason simply for looking suspiciously like an undocumented immigrant. It is supposed to take effect in August, but this is unlikely since it is probably unconstitutional and will face a barrage of court challenges. This Saturday, May Day, the traditional day for workers rights, more than 70 cities are planning protests against the law, and boycotts against Arizona are spontaneously spreading — as they should.