Tikkun Daily Blog Archive (https://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/author/guest/page/11/)
Astronomy teaches us humility and compassion. Of all human virtues, humility is probably the most beautiful and important. It helps us focus on bettering ourselves, rather than focusing on what others are doing.
“In the evening men and women of Tzahal / will sing the Internationale in formation/ dancing through Mea Sh’arim / NO TOUCHING. let’s not get crazy.”
The poor aren’t the ones marching in the street for climate action, driving a Prius, or installing solar panels on their roofs; they drive old cars and live in rented homes and trailers because that’s what they can afford. After finding out that some of them were paying a large portion of their income for heat and electricity because of basic energy inefficiencies, Good Shepherd Episcopal Church took action.
Have you been keeping up with the brilliant web-only articles on tikkun.org? Don’t miss Jonathan Rosenblum’s powerful piece on the immorality of an economic system in which Big Oil is willing to risk workers’ lives for profit, Nancy Abrams’s world-transforming treatise on spirituality and science, Paul Krassner’s discussion of Patty Hearst and the Twinkie Murders, and much more.
State nationalism is at best an uneasy organizing principle for ethnic identity, and at worst yet another force promoting the concentration of power in the hands of a small group of people, and the “standardization” of everyone else toward that “ideal.” The Jews of Eastern Europe were active participants in turn-of-the-century trends of modernization, industrialization, and secularization.
The “Islam is Green” climate action campaign is centered around the Muslim understanding that humans have been given the role of caretaker of the Earth. We must protect it and maintain it, just as we would our own garden with blossoming fruit trees and vegetable plants. Members of the Islamic Education Research Academy and Islam is Green climate action campaign encourage all of us to be caretakers of our extended garden.
Whether the perpetrators of the Mumbai Massacre are brought to justice or not, we cannot afford to remain trapped in an abyss of despair and hatred. The Moshe and Sandra show us how to rehabilitate and rebuild.
Contrary to the expectation of the American Freedom Defense Initiative, Muslim leaders have condemned violence and supported the right to free speech. Most openly exhibit tolerance and follow the Qur’an when it states “And the servants of the Gracious God are those who walk on the earth in a dignified manner, and when the ignorant address them, they say, ‘Peace!’
Our corporate money worshippers often attend services at churches and synagogues. But they worship during the workweek at the altar of money, and we, the 99 percent, have become their sacrificial lambs. Their chase after ever greater wealth is disrupting the very fabric of life on Earth.
The ways of controlling the forces that threaten to destroy human life are all based on psychology instead of weaponry. The only alternatives to the vicious cycle of violence in the Middle East are nonviolent communication, empathy, and direct action.