Tikkun Daily Blog Archive (https://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/category/culture/empathy-culture/page/20/)
Grieving and mourning is the birthplace of healing, repair, and transformation. Once we begin our healing process we will begin to open our hearts with compassion to the experience and suffering of Palestinians.
We don’t need to be a priest or rabbi or imam or monk or a red cross worker or a social worker to make a difference–we just have to be open to God’s presence in our lives and listen to the call to be and make kingdom rise out of this broken and painful world. And every time we do that, we resurrect ourselves and God in this world.
On Wednesday October 10th, in a conversation with the editorial board of the Columbus Dispatch, Mitt Romney said “We don’t have people that become ill, who die in their apartment because they don’t have insurance.” Sit with that quote a minute and think. Really? Beyond knowing in your gut that we do, in fact, have people who die in their apartments, homes, backyards, on the streets, in shelters, at soup kitchens, and in all sorts of places, in part, because they don’t have access to adequate health care, Mitt Romney is missing other parts of the nightmare that is, for 50 million Americans, the reality of not having health insurance. I’ve written about my friend Anna before, and I will keep writing about her, until and maybe even after we get health care in this country right.
Our friend Julie McDonald is traveling across the country by Greyhound bus to talk to real people about their lives and how their life experiences and current situations are impacting how they feel about the upcoming election. She had conversations across America by scooter in 2008 and her storytelling from those conversations touched thousands of lives. Yesterday, Julie watched as mothers put their children onto buses heading to Nogales and then had a conversation about immigration policy with an amazing woman who works at that station every day. Here’s a link to that story, which includes an amazing audio interview. I hope once you hear this first interview you’ll decide to follow Julie as she continues her trek across the county, to bring us more stories.
As I was sitting here in our shop, stocking the shelves while Debate Bingo cards print in the background (yes – we’re going to play debate bingo tonight), I spotted a new email from Rev. Jim Burklo, his latest musing. This is one I simply had to share. He starts with the question “How can we put faith into how we vote?” Read on for his answer. Musings by Jim Burklo
www.tcpc.blogs.com/musingsfor current and previous articles
10-3-12
(This “musing” is excerpted from a speech I gave this past Sunday at First Congregational UCC Church of Palo Alto, CA.You can hear an audio recording of my talkhere.)
SOULFUL CITIZENSHIP
How can we put faith into the way we vote?
Mitt Romney’s 47% comments have really been on my mind the last few days. Two things prompted me to post something here today. One, I had a long conversation with a homeless man who came by our shop on Friday. Two, Rev. Jim Burklo shared a new “musing” somewhat inspired by Gov. Romney’s secretly videotaped musings. I’ll share a bit about my Friday conversation, share all of Jim’s musing, and then close with a bit about how it all fits together.
When I am able to show someone a possible way of making sense of another person’s apparently inhuman acts, the relief, the restoration of possibility, are almost indescribable. Something melts that may have been encrusted for decades.
Professionals, ask yourself, when is the last time you heard these words? “Work is slow today. So the CEO has to go home.” (and by the way, his pay will be cut down to the precise hours worked). And since some of the work he’s doing is not executive-level, let’s call him an administrative assistant while he writes emails, and a VP when he’s not leading a meeting but merely attending one, and pay him at lower levels for those hours. Should a teacher be paid clerk wages while she photocopies materials for her class?
Why am I bringing up a bunch of monastics from the third century A.D.? Because I see so many parallels and dangers inside our own form of empire and so many elements of faith corrupted by the need for polarized absolutes which allow no room for questions and definitely no space for grace. I find myself, for the first time in my life, having a particularly personal empathy for the plight of the desert monks and nuns. I can understand wanting to leave the center of civilization to keep one’s connection to faith, soul, and God.
During one of George Lakey’s train-the-trainer for social activist workshops, people kept mentioning that some tactic or other was a “high-wire” concept for them. After around the third time I heard that, I finally asked “What does she mean by high-wire?” George reached behind him, pulled out a soap box, and explained “What if I told you that I wanted you to take this soap box and walk over to 16th and Mission, stand up on the box, and just start talking to everyone who passes by?” “That would make me very uncomfortable.” I responded.